Masculin Feminin (1966) ***

 

Jean-Luc Godard just died, and while I was actually more surprised than anything to learn that he had still been alive all this time, his death provides an opportunity to watch one of his films and reflect on his film legacy. We had already seen his first film, "Breathless" as well as "Pierrot le Fou," so we decided to check out “Masculin Feminin,” a story of male/female relations.

We meet Paul, a self-serious socialist who divides his time between hanging out with his union activist buddy, Robert, and pursuing a beautiful singer named Madeleine (played by Ye-Ye pop singer Chantal Goya). Paul does not display a lot of charm, but he eventually insinuates himself into Madeleine's life, and the two become a couple. Paul and Robert run around Paris with Madeleine and her two attractive roommates, having long conversations and occasionally dancing, protesting the Vietnam War, and witnessing jarring acts of random violence.

If you look back to the first guy who mixed up some materials to invent paint and smeared it on a cave wall, his work probably isn't all that compelling, out of context. His innovation was not so much his drawing of a hand or an antelope, but the development of new tools that would lead future artists to greatness. I feel the same way about Godard and his fellow New Wave auteurs. The Godard films I have seen are not necessarily great in themselves. They are largely a series of sketches, lacking in story, plot, and sympathetic characters. He seems to thrive on disjointed stories about bored, emotionally-stunted men and the beautiful, pert-titted women who love them, and it is only the latter of these that make his films watchable at all. Godard allows his black-and-white camera to linger lovingly on the faces of his charming, young actresses, some of whom cannot really act. The rest is just experimentation with what you can do on film when you throw out all the rules. This rule-breaking made the world safe for followers like Arthur Penn ("Bonnie and Clyde") and Quentin Tarantino (“Pulp Fiction” and “Reservoir Dogs”).

So, what if you aren't a cinephile or an aspiring filmmaker? Should you watch “Masculin Feminin”? I would say, take a step back first and watch some of the films listed above, as well as movies like Jim Jarmusch's "Down By Law" and Richard Linklater's “Before Sunrise.” Check out some of Whit Stillman's movies, like "The Last Days of Disco". If you find yourself starting to dig movies with long tracking shots, handheld camera work, and jump cuts, and which allow the characters to have long, naturalistic conversations, THEN maybe you will want to go back and watch a movie like “Masculin Feminin” to appreciate how it all got started.

3 stars out of 5

Full Metal Jacket (1987) *****

 

When it comes to war movies, there is none more iconic than “Full Metal Jacket.” Released one year after “Top Gun,” Stanley Kubrick's naturalistic, Vietnam War masterpiece is something of an anti-”Top Gun.” Where “Top Gun” was a celebration of the glories of military service, which measurably boosted recruiting, “Full Metal Jacket” was all about the inhumanity and futility of the war machine. I don't think anyone signed up for the military because they watched “Full Metal Jacket!”

The film is really 2 movies rolled into 1. The first part of the film is a novella about the cruelty of military basic training. We meet Joker (Matthew Modine), a smart-aleck recruit whose sense of humor immediately earns him the ire of drill sergeant Hartman (R. Lee Ermey). Hartman winds up warming to Joker, who is competent, forthright, and “has got guts.” He puts Joker in charge of training up Pvt. Pyle (Vincent D'Onofrio), an overweight, mildly retarded, sweet-natured recruit who cannot seem to stop screwing up.

Hartman has become the standard by which movie drill sergeants are measured. As depicted by the brilliant R. Lee Ermey, he is loud, overbearing, brutal, and bullying. Part of what makes “Full Metal Jacket” great is that it allows Hartman to be something more than a complete villain, however. This is depicted in the grudging respect he grants Joker, and in his attempts to encourage Pyle when he starts to get himself together. He believes it is necessary to be hard on his recruits, because they will need toughness and discipline to survive in the war zone to which they are destined. The problem is that he has only one way to interact with them. He breaks them down as a bully, then grants them the reward of approval when they show improvement. That works for many, but not all. Hartman is part and emblem of a Procrustean military machine that takes young men of various talents and sensibilities and forces them all to fit into the same mold. Anyone who cannot fit the mold is sacrificed un-caringly.

The second, longer portion of the movie is set in Vietnam, where we find Joker assigned as a military journalist for “Stars-and-Stripes.” There, he finds a demoralized American military whose soldiers have no idea what they are fighting for and cannot tell their “allies” from their enemies. He sees a Vietnamese population that is simply tired of war, and which sees the Americans more as occupiers than as saviors. He is not able to write about any of this. Joker is told that they publish two types of stories in “Stars-and-Stripes”: tales of battlefield heroics, and heartwarming stories about soldiers winning the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese people.

Out in the field, Joker is embedded with a platoon and sees firsthand what the war is like, with the outgunned Vietcong relying more on sniper fire and booby-traps than on frontal assaults. In this brutal, mystifying war, Joker finds, survival relies less on the kind of discipline and toughness he learned in basic training, and more on dumb luck. It's a disheartening struggle, where doing the right thing seems impossible.

“Full Metal Jacket” is, in one sense, just one in a line of naturalistic, cynical Vietnam War movies, preceded by films like 1986's “Platoon” and 1979's “Apocalypse Now.” “Full Metal Jacket,” however, is distinguished by its performances and its wit. We see the stories through the eyes of Joker, whose perceptive sense of humor makes the scenes imminently memorable and quotable. Then there's R. Lee Ermey's drill sergeant, who became the standard mold for movie drill sergeants the way Robert Romero's “Night of the Living Dead” monsters became the standard for zombies. Combined with memorable performances from Vincent D'Onofrio, Adam Baldwin (from “Firefly”), and Dorian Harewood, it adds up to an unforgettable and imminently re-watchable war film. As Joker and his buddies march into the sunset, singing the Mickey Mouse Club song, we are left with a message that would be familiar to Voltaire's Candide or to Shakespeare's Hamlet: No one has been saved; nothing has been learned; and the best you can do is try to take care of those close to you.

5 stars out of 5

An American Werewolf in London (1981) ***

 

David Naughton and Griffin Dunne play David and Jack, a couple of American buddies hiking across the north of England. They are expecting cold weather and bland food, but the werewolf takes them by surprise. Jack is killed, and David is wounded in the attack. Waking in a London hospital, David is haunted by visions of his dead friend, warning him that the next full moon will turn him into a werewolf. Despite being comforted by a beautiful nurse (Jenny Agutter), David continues having the visions, and he anticipates the coming full moon with horror. Not TOO much horror, though. “An American Werewolf in London” is a horror-comedy that leans more to the comedy side.

Beloved writer/director John Landis has a massive filmography, including classic comedies like “Trading Places” and “Coming to America.” When he came up with the idea for a werewolf horror-comedy back in 1969, however, he wasn't known for anything. He would have to wait more than a decade, after making a name for himself with “National Lampoon's Animal House” and “The Blues Brothers,” before getting to make his werewolf movie.

The film is best known for its makeup effects, for which makeup artist Rick Baker won an Oscar. It's remarkable how good these effects look now, 40 years later, and to think that Baker did all of that without the aide of CGI. It's appropriate that the film is known for its makeup, because once you get below the surface, there really isn't a lot to it. The story itself is very straightforward, and the film doesn't really invest much into character development. One reason I didn't find the movie scary is that we never get to care enough about any of the characters to be very afraid for them. On the comedy side, the humor is more wry and understated. Some of it is very clever, but when I think of John Landis, I think of the outlandish, physical humor of John Belushi or the barbershop scenes in “Coming to America.” His movies tend to have memorable scenes of hilarity, and “An American Werewolf in London” really does not have that. If anything, the comedy here sometimes sits uneasily next to the attempts at horror, as when Zombie Jack repeatedly exhorts David to commit suicide. When I think about what I will remember from this film, it always comes back to the visuals: Jenny Agutter's beauty, Zombie Jack's progressively decomposed corpse, and, of course, those transformation scenes. “An American Werewolf in London” is a feast for the eyes, even if your brain goes hungry.

3 stars out of 5

A Quiet Place Part II (2020) ***1/2

 

Warning: Spoiler Alert! It's difficult to talk about this sequel without revealing aspects of the original “A Quiet Place”. If you haven't seen it, it's a great movie, and I highly recommend you check it out before reading this!

If ever a movie cried out for a sequel, it is 2018's “A Quiet Place.” John Krasinski's directorial debut was an excellent horror film about a family surviving in a world ravaged by deadly, seemingly-invincible beasts with hyper-acute hearing. Because of their deaf daughter, Regan (Millicent Simmonds), the Abbotts all speak sign language, a unique advantage in this horrifying new world where any sound can bring death. You may recall that they were also raising a new baby, whose cries were obviously a unique disadvantage in that world.

The sequel picks up right where the first film left off. Regan and her mother Evelyn (Emily Blunt) have just discovered a way to kill the aliens, but their home is ravaged by the creatures. Along with Regan's brother Marcus (Noah Jupe) and the new baby, the family head off in search of other survivors. They meet up with their neighbor Emmett (Cilian Murphy), and learn that many other human survivors have turned feral and dangerous.

Part II gives us a couple of gifts. First, we get a look at Day 1, when the creatures first invaded the Abbott's town, with Krasinski reprising his Lee Abbott role for the flashback. We got a sense of the invasion from Lee's news clippings in the first film, but this flashback gives us a full-on look at the creatures ravaging the small town, killing anything that makes a noise. The other gift is Cilian Murphy. We know, from “28 Days Later,” that this guy knows how to survive an apocalypse, and he shines in this film as a lone survivor who reluctantly helps the Abbotts.

Meanwhile,Millicent Simmonds has really matured as an actress. The deaf, nineteen-year-old easily matches Murphy's intensity and earns her role as the most central character in this sequel. Emily Blunt is excellent as well; she just has a little bit less to do in this film than in the first one.

My only complaints about the film are minor, and they center on Krasinski's work as writer and director. “A Quiet Place” was based on a screenplay by Bryan Woods and Scott Beck, with Krasinski directing and doing some re-writes. The film was, in most ways, a riff on the same themes as “Jurassic Park” and “Aliens.” Its main innovation was its emphasis on silence. The Abbotts, and therefore the movie, were as quiet as possible, which was remarkably effective in creating tension. Woods and Beck apparently were not interested in writing a sequel, so Krasinski is wholly responsible for Part II, writing and directing. Right off the bat, he starts with the invasion on Day 1, which is as loud as any action sequence, and the movie rarely gets as quiet as the first film. The exception is a couple of brief but unsettling scenes where we hear the world as Regan hears it, meaning we hear nothing.

My other complaint is that, while Krasinski has created a very effective action film, his sequel hardly advances the “A Quiet Place” story at all. After an hour and a half, I found that I hardly knew any more about the creatures or about the fate of mankind than I did at the end of the first film. I said above that “A Quiet Place” demanded a sequel, but in truth, it would be possible, as Bryan Woods and Scott Beck did, to call it a day after the first film, to let your imagination take it from there. “A Quiet Place Part II” however, really does demand a sequel, as it develops the characters without advancing the story much at all. We need to know where these creatures come from, why (as pointed out in the first film) they don't eat their victims, and whether mankind and the Abbotts will survive.

We will have to wait a bit for all that. “A Quiet Place Part III” is slated for 2025. Meanwhile, there is talk of a spin-off film called “A Quiet Place: Day One” to be released in 2024. I'm a bit skeptical that a spin-off is warranted here, but, as good as these films are, you can bet I'll be watching!

3.5 stars out of 5

Persuasion (2022) ***

 

In the latest iteration of Jane Austin's 1817 novel, Dakota Johnson plays Anne Elliot, middle daughter of Sir Walter, a vain, feckless man whose oldest and youngest daughters mirror his shallowness and narcissism. Anne, however, has a refined character, with a gentle soul and a love for poetry. She also has a broken heart, because, eight years earlier, she let herself be persuaded to turn away the love of her life due to his inferior social station. Frederick Wentworth (Cosmo Jarvis) was a penniless sailor with no title, considered unfit for a girl of Anne's upbringing. Anne has spent the ensuing eight years wallowing in regret. Fate brings Wentworth, now a successful Navy captain, back into Anne's life, but the two are wary of each other. They circle around each other until Anne's sweet, beautiful sister-in-law takes a shine to Wentworth, and Anne comes to believe she has missed her chance again. Just as she is ready to give up on love forever, a handsome, wealthy relative (Henry Golding) sets his sights on Anne.

If it all sounds very familiar, it's the same motif as every Jane Austin story. You take a couple of reluctant lovers who are clearly meant for each other, throw in some complications, and figure out who is going to marry whom. It would be tiresome if it weren't so damn charming! This is theater director Carrie Cracknell's first film, and she spices up Jane Austen's characteristically witty dialogue with a few fun anachronisms (“They say if you're a 5 in London, you're a 10 in Bath!”) The cast is a mixed bag. Richard E. Grant (“Withnail & I”), Yolanda Kettle, and Mia McKenna-Bruce are delightfully funny as Anne's ridiculous family, classic Jane Austen characters. Henry Golding is charming as always, but he isn't given a lot to work with. Cosmo Jarvis as Wentworth is a bit wooden and boring. At the end of the day, “Persuasion” lives and dies by the performance of Dakota Johnson, and fortunately, she is up to the task of carrying the film. You cannot look away from her, and rather than using voice-over to narrate Anne's thoughts, Johnson engages the camera directly, with words and conspiring glances, a-la Phoebe Waller-Bridge, from “Fleabag.” Some reviewers found this engagement distracting, but I think it elevates an otherwise middling Jane Austen adaptation into something really fun.

One thing you have to get used to in “Persuasion” is that several traditionally white, English characters are played by actors who are black, asian, or mixed. It's confusing at first, but then you get used to the idea that, in this film, a person's skin color is not their identity. What a remarkable concept!

3 stars out of 5

Vengeance (2022) ****

Along with everything else, Covid shut down movie production for a while, which means we've been in a real drought while Hollywood catches up. We are finally getting to see some movies that got delayed by the pandemic, and “Vengeance,” written and directed by B.J. Novak (“The Office”), may be the best of the bunch!

Novak plays Ben, a stereotypical, young, callow, New Yorker. He works as a writer and spends his free time hooking up with lots of different girls, but he dreams of being a pod-caster. Ben gets a mystifying call saying that his “girlfriend” Abby has died. Apparently, one of his hook-ups took their relationship a lot more seriously than Ben did, and now she has died of an overdose. Pressured by her family, Ben flies to Texas for the funeral. There, he is told that Abby “would never take so much as an ibuprofen.” Her brother Ty (Boyd Holbrook) is convinced that she was actually murdered, and he wants Ben to help him avenge her. Suddenly, Ben has a subject for a pod-cast!

“Vengeance” could easily be just another fish-out-of-water comedy, but Novak's writing and acting really elevate this film above its genre. He gets an assist from an outstanding supporting cast. J. Smith-Cameron is quietly brilliant as Abbey's mom, while Ashton Kutcher is flamboyantly brilliant as a philosophical record producer, and Issa Rae is just adorable as Ben's editor. Boyd Holbrook, however, steals the show as Abby's brother. He is that rare actor who is charismatic, but completely disappears into his role. He is such a chameleon that it wasn't until I researched the film that I realized he plays The Corinthian in “The Sandman” series, which I had just watched.

In the end, though, it is B.J. Novak's writing that makes “Vengeance” such a great film. Everyone wants to write a story for our times, a tale that addresses our Red State/Blue State divide and reminds us of all we still have in common. Novak's script manages to do it while delivering quite a few laughs.

4 stars out of 5