Things Heard & Seen (2021)

The film makers behind American Splendor are back with a very different movie, a ghost story that fumbles being both scary and original. Things Heard & Seen feels like it is going through the motions, borrowing the cliches of the genre and never reaching past them. The film ends on what appears to be an attempt to present a twisty mystery but what in reality just feels tired and anti-climactic. 

The film needs time to do its slow burn but in that it looses us by being, well.... boring. The tension its trying to build never quite gets there, partially due to how vanilla the characters feel, how much they seem like every other movie of this ilk. So when it starts to gear up and the set pieces start coming none of them feel earned, and I already had checked out, no longer caring.

Berman and Pulcini haven't had a film for a while and unfortunately this isn't a triumphant return. This one feels like a misfire. 

Things Heard & Seen 

Starring: Amanda Seyfried, James Norton, Natalia Dyer, Karen Allen, F. Murray Abraham 

Writers/Directors: Shari Springer Berman, Robert Pulcini
 

GIrl (2020)

Girl is a pulpy narrative set up as a revenge thriller but twists into something a bit different. It ends up exploring the nature of family and how our worlds are shaped by our family, here not for the best. This is a dark take, one that asks us some difficult questions. 

It is also an enjoyable story, one that grabs us quickly and holds us for its full run time, never dragging or veering off from its point. The film is a bit relentless in how it never gives us a moment to relax. There is a moment or two when you think you can, but the film quickly turns to its more pessimistic story and we're back on the edges of our seats. 

Thorne is strong here, giving a powerhouse performance, playing against type. Faust manages to both direct and play a delightfully creepy scenery chewing role. And Rourke is pure... well, Rourke, having the right amount of gravitas and evil. 

Once the film's twists are revealed the story takes us to an end that is the logical conclusion so there are no surprises there but they are satisfying and a bit challenging. We are used to narratives that reinforce our sense of family and belonging and this little story throws all that up in the air giving us an comfortable finish to this bitter little pill. 

Girl

Starring: Bella Thorne, Chad Faust, Mickey Rourke, Lanette Ware, Glen Gould

Writer/Director: Chad Faust

 

Rebecca (1940) REVISIT

Rebecca is a ghost story, sort of. It is the story of a woman whose name is never revealed to us except as she is the second Mrs. De Winter. She is surrounded by people who do not think she is important and, once married, is constantly reminded of the titular Rebecca, the first Mrs. De Winter, whose presence is everywhere. It is about real life ghosts, the kind that haunt us and get in the way of us living our lives. In this case our heroine is only ever allowed to be the second of her name. 

The first act is a romance, the unnamed heroine is swept off her feet by a handsome rich stranger. The scenes are romantic although they feel a bit dated in the way modern audiences understand romance. Still it fits with what we are going to see later, as a woman who never gets to be more than her husband's wife. We are brought into her joy as we see her being mistreated and her journey becomes ours for a reason. The first act is all setting us up for the next chapter, where her world comes crashing down around her due to how no one is able to let the dead Rebecca stay in the past. Fontaine's character is idealized; sweet, pretty, and kind. We are to both sympathize and empathize with her as well as struggle with her against the memories of the past. These attributes are what makes us feel the way we do about her. The whole film is about putting us on her side, we are being conditioned to care about certain people instead of others. 

I was first introduced to this film through reading I had done on queer coding in Hollywood's golden age. This is perhaps the classic example with the "villain," Mrs. Danvers, being presented as lesbian in the eyes of audiences of the age. Hitchcock commonly used queer coding in his films, often in ways that were subversive, not just to pit his audience against certain characters. But here it is the classic use which is portrayed. Danvers is cruel due to her love of the previous Mrs. De Winter, and her end isn't presented as tragic, it's what she deserves, because we are on the side of the sweet and charming new Mrs.  

But as I rewatched this film with a more 21st century eye, I began to see how today's audiences are prepared to watch these stories differently. This is the story of a woman who finds out her new husband played a hand in the death of his first wife from an unhappy marriage, attempted to cover it up, and then she makes a conscious decision to help him "get a way with it." The audiences of the time would have seen all of this as just based on their values of the day but today it is hard not to see this as confounding. We have to question who really has acted badly, and whose actions were justified or not. Perhaps today we might view this story with different eyes, different understandings. And perhaps as Manderlay burns down we are wonder what justice has been served? 

The film remains outstandingly beautiful and Hitchcock slowly builds the tension in a delicious manner, transitioning from the romance of the beginning into the growing claustrophobic energy of the second half. The only film of his to win the Best Picture Oscar and often cited as one of his best films, I think the film's story is fascinating for the way it needs some re-examining.The visual and narrative elements have held up incredibly but the story at its centre is one that leaves me feeling chilled. Watching a story designed to illicit certain emotions only to have a very different reaction, different sympathies, is a fascinating experience and in that the journey of the film remains a powerful one. Perhaps it is time to reevaluate Rebecca as something of darker tale that it may have even been originally intended. 

Rebecca

Starring: Lawrence Olivier, Joan Fontaine, Judith Anderson, George Sanders

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Writers: Robert E Sherwood, Joan Harrison, Philip MacDonald, Michael Hogan

Mortal Kombat (2021)

What I expected and wanted from a Mortal Kombat movie: a decent story that provides for graphic fights to the death. What I got from the reboot of the Mortal Kombat movie: a decent story that provides for graphic fights to the death.

Sometimes a B-movie transcends its pulpy tropes and conventions and becomes something more. That's not what's happened here. What this film does is recreate the feel of the play of this popular game, from the moves to the visuals, but in a cinematic narrative format. It does so better than the earlier movie attempts. It is just what it needs to be, and nothing more. It is short and satisfying. You'll groan at the hits and cheer at the victories. That's what we're buying our tickets for. 

The film captures the nature of the characters and manages to bring them vibrant life. Sure the characters are one dimensional and the film does nothing to expand that. But they are all this story requires. 

So yes, sure, I believe any property has the potential to speak more profoundly to the human experience, can capture something honest and real in its narrative. But it's okay for some stories just to be simple, fun, and rather meaningless. Maybe no one is screaming for a Mortal Kombat movie to explore the existential pain of loss and death, sacrifice and honour. Maybe all we want is the "finish him." 

And we get that here. 

Mortal Kombat

Starring: Lewis Tan, Joe Taslim, Jessica McNamee, Joss Lawson, Mehcad Brooks, Ludi Lin, Tadanobu Asano, Chin Han, Hiroyuki Sanada

Director: Simon McQuoid

Writers: Greg Russo, Dave Callaham

 

Stowaway (2021)

Stowaway is one of those films that feels more like a thesis than a story. It's built on a problem. A mission to Mars designed to support 3 people is disrupted when a fourth person "stows away," albeit accidentally, and forces them to wrestle with the idea that they will all die unless one of them dies. That's it. That's the whole movie. The film spends a lot of time, I mean a lot of time, explaining why there is no other way. One of them has to be sacrificed. Finally (mild spoiler) one of them chooses to sacrifice themselves and the movie ends. 

Despite what feels like an overly constructed idea that never quite finds a way to be organic, the film still mostly works. The runtime isn't excessive. Writer/director Penna manages to build incredible tension throughout, as well as a great deal of empathy. The film is strong in how it honestly generates the sense of loss, personally felt by the audience. The small cast means there isn't a lot to distract us. The script smartly invests us in this handful of people and forcing us to choose one ends up being emotionally fraught. A lot of this has to do with the cast, top notch all, who deliver on this idea, making the payoff strong even if, again, I felt it was a bit too pat. 

But the idea itself is a worthy one to explore. Sure this is a simple premise and the film just makes excuses for why there can never be any other solution. But it speaks to something more. We in western culture have agreed tacitly that for the rest of us to thrive some of us must be sacrificed. This story puts this in our face and forces us to make a choice. Who should it be? There are very good, logical reasons why it should be one, but the film asks us to recognize the consequences of that. By casting the only black actor in the role of the sacrificial lamb the film is teaching us more about ourselves than we may want to face. The film, even with its small cast, gets us to look at how gender and race and vulnerability play into how these choices are made in real life.

So while the film felt a bit too overly constructed it overcame this enough for me to appreciate what it was doing. And I liked that it didn't find a way to miraculously pull a heroic moment to save the day as that would have truly missed the point. Sure I would have loved it if the film spent a little more time making it all feel more natural but it still did what I needed it to do to get onboard. And it made me ask myself some difficult questions, the answers of which I really didn't like. For that it gets points. 

Stowaway

Starring: Anna Kendrick, Toni Collette, Daniel Dae Kim, Shamier Anderson

Director: Joe Penna

Writers: Ryan Morrison, Joe Penna

 

Porky's (1981) REVISIT

Known as one of the most infamous teen sex comedies ever, on rewatch Porky's turns out to be so much more than I remember from my adolescent days. Remarkably it is written and directed by A Christmas Story director Bob Clark who, within this irreverent sex romp, layers in an insightful and not-at-all subtle deconstruction of racism in 1950 Americana. Also the film surprisingly refuses to villainize sexually active women, instead centering them while playfully mocking the horny teen boys pursuing them. 40 years on and Porky's is surprisingly progressive compared to pretty much any film of the genre to come before or later. 

The film isn't perfect for sure. There is fatphobia sprinkled through out which isn't forgivable. But the approach to the unrelenting male sexual drive is fierce. There are numerous scenes of men getting their comeuppance for being aggressive with women or not seeking consent, all stitched into the "tittilating" scenes designed around humour. The men are the butt of the jokes, no pun intended. The film is equal opportunity with its nudity, showing full frontal of women and men, more likely for laughs than for exploitation. Clark cleverly blends the ad advertised "peepshow" elements with his larger messages about what we'd now call toxic masculinity, institutionalized racism, and sex positivity. Before even mainstream films were exploring these topics, this subversive little sex comedy was taking them on, grabbing the bull by the preverbal horns. 

And the film remains damn funny. There are some truly smart lines in this film, often rising above the toilet humour these sorts of films focus on, while also making some truly funny sex jokes. Yes the film is knowingly absurd but that feels like a device used to tell this story, a story which manages to entertain throughout, not just during the nude scenes. I mean there is no reason for a drain to be in a locker room shower in the place where it is for the film's most famous of scenes, but that doesn't matter. It's for the laughs, not even for the shock of seeing naked women in the shower, a blink and you'll miss it moment that is transformed into a scene of hilarity instead, as well as another opportunity for the film to come down on the men for peeking without consent. 

As I said, the women of the film aren't shamed for being sexual. A number of the female characters embrace being sexually active and the film never makes us disrespect them for it. In fact when a couple of teachers are fired for having sex in the locker room, this is scene as an injustice, not as an appropriate consequence. In other ways of upending our expectations, the muscular jock most often played as the dumbass is presented here as a candidate for Princeton. Porky's continually refuses to fall into the stereotypes not only of the genre but of popular movies in general of the age.

And the film, sold on it promise of peek-a-boo nude scenes, ends up telling us a story about sexually positive teens shutting down the racist, sexual puritanism of their 1950 American town. This little piece of Americana actually shakes up the very notions we have of that and makes us laugh along the way. 

Porky's

Starring: Dan Monahan, Kim Cattral, Nancy Parsons, Boyd Gains, Susan Clark, Alex Karras, Chuck Mitchell, Art Hindle

Director: Bob Clark

Writers: Roger Swaybill, Bob Clark

 

Oscar Nominated Shorts (2021)

Short films are a joy, they allow a different sort of film making than most features ever are able to explore. They can offer us something a bit unique, more original than we are used to seeing in longer films. This year, as a fan of animation, I am very disappointed in the crop of animated films nominated in this category. I know there were way better short animated films released this year. because I have seen them. But the Academy nominated a better crop of live action and documentary films, even if the latter are on the depressing side as they confront much of our inhumanity... and those who have the strength to stand up to it. Here are my thoughts on this year's picks. 

Live Action

Feeling Through

This is the story of a young man confronted with a connection he wasn't expecting at a time he didn't need it, when we encounters a deaf blind man in the middle of the night. Simple in its presentation but powerful in its execution, this lovely story of humanness is the most inspiring of this bunch, but not in a cheap way, in an honest feeling way.

The Letter Room

Funny and poignant, this is the only of the nominated short dramatic films which features Hollywood stars (Oscar Isaac, Alia Shawkat), and its story moves from humorous to emotional very effectively in its short run time, beautifully taking us on a complicated journey in the way only short films can. A reminder of just how wonderful this genre can be. 

The Present

There are many places in the world where arbitrary systems interfere with the day to day lives of regular people. This Palestinian example is powerful in the way it slowly builds the microagressions into a moment of terror which will make your heart pound. 

Two Distant Strangers

Who would have thought you could mash up Groundhog Day and Queen and Slim into what ends up being a prescient examination of the trauma of being a young Black man in America. It never quite ends up being what you expect and keeps challenging your expectations of where it's going to take us. It is my favourite of the group. 

White Eye

This unassuming little film about a moment in time, about a man finding his stolen bike, and how that expands into consequences he didn't anticipate, is beautiful in its simplicity reminding us that sometimes the simple things have big impacts in our lives and the lives of others. 

Animation

Burrow

This little story about a bunny trying to build a home in a busy corner of the underground is cute and all, but when you look at all the other Pixar Sparkshorts which were released last year you have to wonder why the academy nominated this rather unremarkable film. However I do love that Pixar, a studio created to make CGI animated films, is producing these hand drawn shorts when few other major studios are working in that medium any longer. 

Genius Loci

Speaking of hand drawn animation, this French film is a self-consciously a series of hand drawn images. Its story is almost as abstract as its visuals. It presents a difficult narrative to get into, one that feels purposefully opaque which keeps some of it from resonating. But what one can crack from this is powerful in its way. 

If Anything Happens I Love You

The most tragic and powerful of the group, this bleak tale is about finding hope after the worst that can happen, and perhaps not letting it get worse. The film is stark with its colourless palette and mood. Still, perhaps more than the other films in this category it stirs up emotions, difficult ones. 

Opera

While striking for all that is going on at once, all the little pieces moving, the film drags on a bit and feels more like it's trying to make a point than tell us a story. I appreciated how different it looked from most other animated films we see in its dedication to its form, but it didn't have enough to grab us to sustain its runtime. 

Yes People

The only CGI animation in the bunch and it's cleverly designed to look like old school CGI. The film is the least of the group, being sweet and cute but with little substance, or even compelling story. 

Documentary

Colette

This story of a French resistance member going to visit the site of a concentration camp where her brother was killed challenges a lot of our contemporary assumptions about WWII and those who were caught up in it. It also gets us to see how recent these events and their legacy remain. I appreciated how it avoided being 'inspiration porn" and perhaps touched on something deeper. 

A Concerto is a Conversation

The happiest film of this group, this film is a celebration of a musician's success and the sharing of that with his grandfather, a man who overcame so much to create the world his grandson can be be a success in. My favourite of the nominees, the film is beautifully shot and lovingly made. It is a short love letter to being all you can be and recognizing where you come from. 

Do Not Split

This observational style doc about protestors in Hong Kong willing to use violent tactics to advance their cause is tense and riveting. The film doesn't comment directly so we are just witnesses to the clashes between protestors and the state forces. In the west we often turn a blind eye to what's happening in Hong Kong and this film forces us to take a hard look. 

Hunger Ward

This is one of those films that is so difficult to watch. The idea of watching children starve is appropriately horrendous, but how do we ever bring about an end to this completely man made horror until we look it in the face? Hunger Ward forces us to face the worst of ourselves yet perhaps some of the best of ourselves too, in how it focuses on women doing everything they can in the worst situations. Longer than is almost tolerable, but also powerful in the way it forces us to confront a horror that we want to turn away from. 

A Love Song For Latasha

This is the story of Latasha Harlins, who was murdered in a convenience store, as told, not through the circumstances of her death, but in the memories of her life by those who love her. It's a gorgeous film and the power of it comes from the joy it celebrates even while contemplating the terrible loss of life that happens each day in the USA.