Motherless Brooklyn

First Hit: Meandering and unfocused attempt to bring this Jonathan Lethem novel to life on the big screen.

Screenwriter, Director, and Actor Edward Norton failed to make this an engaging crime thriller in the tradition of Roman Polanski’s “Chinatown.” Although there were aspects of this film, I thought exquisite, for instance the jazz club scenes and the scenes in Moses Randolph’s office, generally it felt long and tired.

One way it felt tired to me was me having to analyze scenes to see if things were making sense as the film moved along. Often, they didn’t, which is tiring. For instance, a few early scenes in the Minna Detective Agency office were confusing, and I found myself questioning how the agency made any money and had pleasantly nice offices. Everybody in the office seemed flush, not struggling. There were hints that people in the agency drove people around in cars for a fee and that this was a side business, but everyone at the agency always seemed to be in the office and sitting at their desks doing nothing. I kept thinking, how did all four guys in the agency make money? The main character Lionel Essrog (Edward Norton), always seemed to have money to buy drinks with lavish tips, pay for taxis, and buy dinner or two for meetings with other people.

These and other logic questions kept popping up in my mind as the film wore on and took me away from engaging more with the story.

Basically, the story is about Lionel’s dedication to his boss and friend Frank Minna (Bruce Willis). Because Frank gets shot and killed early in the story, Lionel has to find out who did it. He cannot let go of the puzzle in his head, which is where his being afflicted with Tourette’s Syndrome adds to the plot. He’s always blurting out comments at an inopportune time, but it helps him to drive to answers to open questions.

The trail to find his boss’s killer begins from a hint Frank whispered to Lionel just before his death in the hospital from a gunshot wound that Lionel witnessed.

The hint has to do with a woman, Laura Rose (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), who un-be-knowingly was fathered by a powerful city politician Moses Randolph (Alec Baldwin). Although he’s never in an elected spot, he’s always been chosen to run the public parks, building commission, and the housing commission. This is where the real power of control over the city lies.

The audience sees his bullying ways in an early scene when he storms into the Mayor's office and demands to have all the commissions he had before the recent election.

Randolph has a genius brother, Paul (Willem Dafoe), whom he keeps on a short leash and on the edge of hope. Paul figures into the story because Lionel interviews him and learns more about his controlling brother Moses.

I can say that I spent 2 ½ hours watching some good scenes with some excellent acting sprinkled in along the way. However, the meandering nature of the movie and overly complicated scenes to achieve a visible result were not well-intentioned.

Norton was at times good as Lionel, but somehow his expression of the syndrome became part of the distraction versus adding to the film and story. It’s a difficult thing to do, and at times it failed. Willis’ small but pivotal part was good while it lasted. Mbatha-Raw was outstanding as Rose. Her ability to be both strong and vulnerable was effectively used. Baldwin was the best of the bunch in this film. Without any doubt he brought the role of powerful non-elected city politician to life. His conversation with Lionel about the importance of building his future dream city was wonderfully done. Dafoe gives a reliable performance as the younger brother of Moses. He's continually seeking approval for his work, and his subsequent disappointment was exquisitely displayed towards the end of the story when he opens an envelope, filled with hope, only to find something else. For me one of the most compelling scenes was between Lionel and Trumpet Man (Michael Kenneth Williams). While in Trumpet Man’s home, he and Lionel talk about their respectively messed up heads and how they each try to soothe their inner beasts. Watching Williams's performance, I was transfixed. Norton both wrote and directed this film. The direction of his own performance needed work. He seemed too engaged with watching himself where trimming his screen time might have helped the film by being more focused. However, he does have directorial talent and was able to evoke several powerful scenes by letting the talent shine.

Overall: I can say that I spent 2 ½ hours watching some good scenes with some excellent acting sprinkled in a long, meandering, and overly complicated moments to achieve an obvious result.

Isle of Dogs

First Hit: I liked the premise and animation a lot, however, there were scenes that were not needed which made this film longer than needed.

Director Wes Anderson creates quirky and interesting films. Here, Wes uses stop-motion animation to create a world that, at times, reflects current events. The film references earthquakes and a power plant failure that spread radiation. All events that happened in Japan.

The general plot is that Mayor Kobayashi (voice by Kunichi Nomura), mayor of Megasaki, is a cat person as are his immediate family and his ancestors. However, dog lovers have been ruling Megasaki and therefore dogs reign supreme in Megasaki. Coming into power Megasaki sends all the dogs to “Trash Island,” a place where trash is piled up.

The reason he states is because the dogs have a disease that cannot be cured and eventually it will affect humans.

Atari Kobayashi (voice by Koyu Rankin) is a young twelve-year-old boy who wants his dog Spots back. He commandeers a small plane and crashes it on Trash Island. He runs into a pack of dogs Chief (voice by Bryan Cranston), Rex (voice by Edward Norton), King (voice by Bob Balaban), Boss (voice by Bill Murray), and Duke (voice by Jeff Goldblum, who decide to help him find Spots.

Many of the scenes were fun to watch and extremely well developed. However, scenes like when the dogs in the overhead lift going through a destruction and crushing building were not needed. It added little to the overall suspense and only created a unneeded scene and added to making the film longer.

The personalities of the dogs were great and a wonderful combination of animal and human points of view. This held up well. The focus of a boy’s love of his dog works. And when it comes forth that all dogs love twelve-year-old boys was perfect.

Rankin, Balaban, Norton, Cranston, Murray, Goldblum, and Nomura were wonderful in their voice characterizations. Anderson and Roman Coppola wrote a wonderful script although there were scenes that could have been cut to make the film crisper. Anderson’s direction was excellent although some scenes were unnecessary.

Overall: A strong and entertaining film in a format we don’t see very often.

Collateral Beauty

First Hit:  Wonderful concept, wonderful cast, mediocre execution.

The idea that someone could talk with Love, Time and Death is interesting. Having a cast with Will Smith (as Howard), Edward Norton (as Whit), Kate Winslet (as Claire), Michael Pena (as Simon), Helen Mirren (as Brigitte and Death), Keira Knightly (as Amy and Love), Jacob Latimore (as Raffi and Time), and Naomie Harris (as Madeleine) all in one film is amazing. However, there was something about the script and way it was directed that had this film fall short of its potential.

The title “Collateral Beauty” was also at fault in some ways. Normally when we hear the word “collateral” we hear it with the word “damage”. This term is used in the movie as a lesson or mantra that Madeleine hears after the loss of her child. When she was in the hospital, just prior to her daughter’s death, an old woman sitting next to her outside her dying child’s room said, do not be so taken by grief that you forget to see the collateral beauty. The movie does nothing to really show what this means.

The focus of the film is that Howard, who is a brilliant advertising creative executive, loses his young 6-year old daughter to a disease. The company he’s built with Whit, Claire and Simon begins to suffer and is now losing clients because of his disengagement with work. He spends his days building domino trails then knocking them down, or riding his bike at night through the streets of New York City. To save their company and investments Whit, Claire and Simon arrange to have Amy, Raffi and Brigitte pretend to be Love, Time and Death respectively in hopes of communicating with Howard to bring him out of his deep sorrow.

Although this is done with some seriousness, the constructs and building of the story is weak. When the words and concept of "Collateral Beauty" are passed from Madeleine to Howard, the failure to engage the audience and Howard are palpable. It is at this point I realized that this film, regardless of how it finishes, would be lack luster.

Smith was OK as the once engaging advertising company creator, leader and grieving father. Norton was slightly better as Howard’s business partner. Winslet was fine as the morally caring business partner. Pena was very good as the ill business executive who cares about his family. Knightly was good as Love. Mirren was very good as Death, her style brought strength to the film. Latimore was strong as Time. Harris was very strong as the grieving mother. Allan Loeb wrote a weak screenplay in that the characters lacked depth and the story never grew. Direction by David Frankel was weak in that he never saw the failings of the story to find ways to make it have more depth. The film never really shared the beauty of a child’s depth which, in this case, was supposed to be collateral.

Overall:  Although somewhat engaging at the beginning, it fails to fulfill any beauty collateral or not.

Birdman Or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)

First Hit:  One of the most amazing films I’ve ever watched.

What struck me and continues to strike me about this film was the way it was filmed. It is filmed like it all came from one camera with no edits.

Although I was amazed from the very beginning, there is a scene, where the camera is on a balcony ledge, looking up at a dark sky with a building in the background, the lights in the building change, the darkness of the sky changes to morning, and then the camera backs off the ledge moves down the building it was on and finally backs into Riggan’s (Michael Keaton) dressing room where the action picks up again.

The shot is phenomenal as are most of the shots in this film. What makes all this better is that the acting is also sublime.

This story about a man who wants to revitalize his acting career on Broadway after becoming famous as a superhero named “Birdman”. Not that the film is suppose to have a similar real life link to Keaton’s own acting life as Batman, - it does. But it is much more and deeper than this. It is about finding a place to be relevant and honest with oneself in some way.

Joining Riggan in the play he is putting on is Lesley (Naomi Watts) who has been striving her whole life to do an opening night on Broadway. Then there’s current girlfriend Laura (Andrea Riseborough) who wants to have a baby but struggles with Riggan’s inattention and is angelic in the play.

Lastly, on stage with him is Mike (Edward Norton) who is Leslie’s boyfriend and New York City stage actor supreme. His method rankles and enhances Riggan’s vision for the play. Although the story interacts with and at times becomes the story, the overall story is about Riggan becoming who he a man he likes and cares about.

Keaton is at his absolute best as Riggan and Birdman. He’s naked on the screen, we can see him. Watts is superb. Her execution of her role is perfect. Riseborough is great. The scene where she tells Riggan that she is pregnant is touchingly wonderful. Norton is beyond amazing. His command of the role is perfect. He shows just the right amount of arrogance and thoughtfulness. Emma Stone is truly a wonder. Her role as Riggan’s daughter is one of the most startling pieces of supporting work on the screen this year. Her hauntingly, desperate, and thoughtful view of the world is perfect. All of these actors gave Oscar worthy consideration performances. Zach Galifianakis as Riggans attorney and co-producer was also very, very strong. Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu and Nicolas Giacobone wrote this amazing screenplay. Their use of words to make emotional points was spot on. Inarritu’s direction of the cinematographer, actors, and execution of the story will have him considered at Academy Awards time.

Overall:  An amazing piece of art, and that is what this film is, an outstanding and sublime piece of art.

The Grand Budapest Hotel

First Hit:  A very whimsical fun film that also has a little darkness.

Wes Anderson has the ability to create sets and scenes that float magically in one’s mind between silly and serious (think of the scene with each person dining at their own table in this well appointed dining room).

It is a whimsical, almost in a silly way, to show how people are so separate from each other. The story in this film is being retold by the Lobby Boy (“Mr. Moustafa” – F. Murray Abraham) who ended up owning this old historic hotel which is definitely on its down-side. Back in the day, the famous concierge Gustave H. (Ralph Fiennes) and the Lobby Boy (“Zero” – Tony Revolori) got ahold of a famous painting left to him by Madame D. (Tilda Swinton). But her son Dmitri (Adrien Brody) doesn’t want Gustave to have any of his mother’s possessions.

To add to the dynamics of the film, Anderson mixes war (WWII) in to this story. As you watch the film, becoming engaged, Wes throws in a levels of whimsy by showing you things like a ski chase scene that is totally unrealistic, however it is perfect for the overall film and story. Anderson also has the ability to have small integral parts filled by big name actors (like Edward Norton and Bill Murray) which make this film work amazingly well.

Fiennes is great and perfect for this part. His intelligent humor and wit are perfect for Gustave. Revolori is remarkable as the Lobby Boy wanting to follow in his bosses footsteps. Swinton is not recognizable as a wealthy and very old Madame. Willem Dafoe is great as the sinister Jopling. Jeff Goldblum is wonderfully commanding as Deputy Kovacs. Harvey Keitel is perfect as Ludwig a prisoner. Bill Murray is strong as M. Ivan. Edward Norton is sublime as Henkels. Saoirse Ronan is superb as the Lobby Boy’s girlfriend Agatha. Abraham is wonderfully engaging as the aged Lobby Boy. I could go on but it isn’t necessary. Wes Anderson wrote and directed this film with just the right touch of amusement, storytelling, and amazing sets.

Overall:  This film was fun to watch and interestingly crafted.