The Aeronauts

First Hit: Although the ground scenes lack any conviction or interest, the up in the air scenes are amazingly shot and provide lots of tension.

Two things that surprised me while watching this film. One; how wonderful it was that Amelia Wren (Felicity Jones) was the amazingly brave and daring character in this story. Two, the difference between the mediocre ground-based scenes and fantastic air-based scenes was almost too significant to make the whole film work.

In short, James Glaisher (Eddie Redmayne) was a scientist and part of The Royal Society, where the big thinkers of the day held court where they expound on grand ideas, philosophy and scientific postulates. Glaisher thought that he and others should be able to predict the weather if they had more information about the atmosphere and how it works. The society laughed at him.

To prove his point, he wanted to go up in a lighter than air balloon to take measurements. The person he asks is Wren, who is still mourning the loss of her husband, Pierre, who was also an aeronaut balloon pilot and took his life to save his wife’s during an ill-fated flight.

The film uses flashbacks throughout to show how Wren and Glaisher meet, and how they ended up in the first scene where Glaisher is impatiently waiting for Wren to show up to their launch site. Wren, on her way in a coach, is both scared and brave in her path to confront the feelings she’ll have been in a balloon for the first time since her husband’s death.

When she finally arrives at the launch site, she’s quite the showman and gives the broad audience, who is here to witness this event, lots of ways to enjoy the beginning of this balloon launch. These scenes include a small dog. It is an enjoyable part of the opening scenes.

However, it is after they take off that the real drama comes into play. Enough to say, it is not only the views they get while rising to a then-record of 38,000 feet (without oxygen) but it is what happens to the balloon and how Wren powerfully saves their lives by doing something I don’t think I would ever consider, even if my life depended on it.

These scenes are beyond tense, well shot, and exciting and it makes this film worth watching.

Lastly, one thing I wondered about through the entire film was what were they using for the lighter other than air gases? Because this wasn’t hot air they were using as there was no flame device to heat the air inside the balloon.

Jones is exceptional in this role. Her portrayal of the Amelia Wren as an Aeronaut and woman was first-rate. She also did an excellent job of showing her sadness and love towards her former husband while conquering fear by piloting the balloon. Redmayne was perfect as Glaisher, but for some reason, he was so overshadowed by Jones that he got lost in the film. When his character gives his talk at the Royal Society after his excursion with Wren, I thought that his pride in proving something felt egoic and small. It did show the smallness of humans whereas the big picture was carried by Wren. Hamish Patel was terrific as Glaisher’s friend and supporter. Tom Harper and Jack Thorne wrote a good screenplay, but it really came to life while in the air, and here is where Harper’s direction and filming made this worth watching.

Overall: Having been up in a hot air balloon, I can only imagine what they were going through as they passed through the higher reaches of the atmosphere where a man can survive without oxygen.

On the Basis of Sex

First Hit: Outstanding and moving film about one of the most inspirational women in United States history – ever.

In May of 2018, I saw and reviewed the documentary “RBG.” It was an amazing factual film about a woman who changed the course of gender equality in the United States.

In this dramatic version, we have Felicity Jones as Ruth Bader Ginsburg providing some of the drama behind the story of one of the most inspirational women to ever practice law in the United States. Today at 85 years old, and a Supreme Court Justice, she is still trailblazing how we look at the law and its impact on gender equality.

When the dean of Harvard Law School Erwin Griswold (Sam Waterston) invites the women who made it into his school, over for dinner at his home, he asks each of them to share why they deserve to take a man’s place at Harvard’s prestigious law school. It is a defining moment in the film to share with the audience how horribly sexist these institutions were towards women. Ginsburg’s answer is divinely dripping of sarcasm that went over Griswold’s head.

Ruth’s husband Martin (Armie Hammer) is also a law student at Harvard focusing on Tax Law. His support of his wife’s journey in law school is wonderful. Unfortunately, he contracts testicle cancer which he has only a 5% chance of beating, and Ruth, showing support, takes his classes and hers so that her husband doesn’t have to drop out of school while he recovers. Using the notes she took from his classes, she teaches Martin what he needs to know to pass his classes. She’s doing the work of two students as well as caretaker and mother.

Being a couple years behind her husband, he graduates and gets a job in a prestigious New York Cit law firm. This leaves Ruth with having to make a choice, raise their daughter alone and continue with law school at Harvard or moved with her husband and finish her schooling at Columbia. She chooses the later.

The film explores the unfairness of being a woman becoming a lawyer in this mostly man’s world. Additionally, it explores how her daughter Jane (Cailee Spaeny) is being affected by the changing culture of the 1960’s. We see how the dynamics of this culture change helped Ruth see the laws that needed changing and she found ways, with the help of Martin, to make her case to a State Supreme Court and to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Some of the scenes were amazingly poetic. Like when Martin hands a tax issue case to Ruth with the proviso, read this and you’ll see where you can make a difference. She did. I loved when Ruth takes Jane to see famed civil rights attorney Dorothy Kenyon (Kathy Bates) and upon walking back out into the streets, how Jane handles the harassing men and gets Ruth and her a cab. There were also a couple great scenes with Ruth and ACLU lead lawyer Mel Wolf (Justin Theroux). Lastly the scene in which she argues in the State Supreme Court for equal rights of a man was very well done.

For me the downsides of the film were, I would have liked Ruth’s first case in the U.S. Supreme court to be part of this film. Also, I found that Felicity’s accent fluctuations to be slightly problematic. Her voice lacked consistency.

On the upside when Jones gets ready to argue the main case at the State’s Supreme Court, she has Ruth’s look and feel down pat. Lastly, I loved the part where we see Ruth (Jones) climbing the steps to the U.S. Supreme Court and then see the real Ruth.

Felicity was very good as Ruth. Despite the accent variations, she brought a strength and character to Ruth and seemed to match the Ruth in the earlier documentary. Hammer was excellent. I loved his kind, thoughtful, and supportive lightheartedness he brought to this role. Spaeny was outstanding. I thought her portrayal of a young woman caught up in the movements of the 1960’s and also wanting to be respectful of her dynamic parents was sublime. I hope to see her in more films. Theroux was far better than I thought he’d be. My surprise is that he often takes sinister roles her here he shows a funny, smart, supportive side. Bates was sublime as with wizened civil rights lawyer who brings respect and a true grass roots feeling to the film. Waterston was excellent as the self-righteous sexist head of Harvard’s Law school. Daniel Stiepleman wrote a wonderful screenplay. Mimi Leder put the right touch on this film.

Overall: I thoroughly enjoyed this film as the first film of the year to see and review.

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

First Hit:  Could not get into the story nor did I think it was well thought out.

A franchise series of films is always challenging. Even one of the best, Star Wars, has had some clunkers or at least clunker moments; think Jar Jar Binks in “Episode I – The Phantom Menace”. Where does this film fit with the series? My guess is that it probably fits after “Episode III:  Revenge of the Sith” and “Episode IV:  A New Hope”.

Was this film needed to make the series whole? Probably not, but it was a way for Disney to make it a key component in the series as this tells the bit about the Princess Leia (Ingvild Deila) and the Rebel Alliance getting the plans to Death Star. As we know in later episodes Leia implanted these plans into R2-D2.

Although this was an OK idea, the film fell apart in one of the later opening scenes where Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen), his wife Lyra (Valene Kane), and their child Jyn (Dolly Gadsdon – youngest, Beau Gadsdon – young, and Felicity Jones - adult) were found by agents of the Empire hiding on a small deserted planet Lah’mu.

I do not know how, but during the dialogue between Galen and Orson Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn) about their involvement with the design and use of the Death Star, I lost interest. Maybe it was the convoluted opening, the rip off use of the opening for the first Star Wars film or maybe it was simply not interesting enough.

My hope picked up again when Saw Gerrera (Forrest Whitaker) finds young Jyn and takes her to safety. Here I thought, OK with Whitaker we'll get some meat into this storyline, but again this fell short. I've always been able to count on Whitaker to make something better, but his role wasn't critical and I fell back into unengaged and uninterested in what was taking place on the screen.

The story leaps in time to find Jyn (now played by Jones) being an important and, at times, a despised member of the Alliance because her father's role in completing work on the Death Star. Her status as leader or rebel of substance happens, not by anything she does, but because her father sends her a message, through a hologram, that he’s made a back-door flaw in the Death Star which the Alliance can use to destroy it.

By this time the audience is treated to an elongated battle which is poorly choreographed. There are some nice CG effects, but the acting, storyline and dependence on battle scenes to create action and interest weighed this film down.

Jones does not have the chops to make a believable rebel character or leader. There is a lack of innate strength of spirit which her acting cannot overcome that makes her a weak link in this film. Whitaker is wasted in this role as a wise elder warrior for the Alliance. Mikkelsen is good as Galen, but the role is limited by the script. Diego Luna (playing Cassian Ando Rebel Intelligence Officer) gave it his best, but the script and story didn’t have this character develop. His big turning point moment is when he’s supposed to kill Galen (unknown to Jyn); what does he choose? Donnie Wen (as Chirrut Imwe) playing a blind Jedi wanna-be was OK and provided some amusing moments. Chris Weitz and Tony Gilroy wrote a weak script and the lack of direction, thereby creating an uninteresting film with characters we don't care about, falls on Gareth Edwards.

Overall:  This film feels like a throwaway created for money because all the main characters die, their story ends, and it filled a small gap in the Star Wars saga sequence.

Inferno

First Hit:  It started interestingly and then simply fell off the table by an overly complex and poorly developed script, poor acting, and feeble direction.

I’ve not been a fan of any of the Da Vinci Code oriented films. The best was the first and quickly sank with Angles & Demons. It stays on this downward track with Inferno. Here we’ve got Tom Hanks reprising his character Robert Langdon, who knows more than anyone about Dante, his words, and other’s interpretations of Dante’s work.

The film starts confusingly with Langdon hurt in the hospital with a head injury. He’s confused and is being attended by a physician named Sienna Brooks (Felicity Jones). We are also introduced to Billionaire Bertrand Zobrist (Ben Foster), who is convinced that the world is on the verge of collapse. It is 11:59 – one minute till the world collapses because of over population and environmental issues caused by the over population. To right this sinking ship, he wants to spread a virus that will wipe out earth’s population.

With these two plot setups; Langdon being attacked, having amnesia, and why he has a projection device showing Dante’s hell in a picture but the picture has been altered, and the other setup is Zobrist wants to destroy the world’s population. Added to this we have people trying to kill Langdon, the WHO (World Health Organization) trying to stop Zobrist, WHO agent Christoph Bouchard (Omar Sy) who appears to be on some other side, Vayentha (Ana Ularu) a motorcycle riding person wanting to kill Langdon, and Harry Sims (Irrfan Khan) a hired security consultant whose interest in anything is questionable.

Confused, you got it, and that is how the film unfurled itself. What really muddied up this story is that the writer and/or director wanted Langdon to have a tangential and unrequited love interest with WHO’s Elizabeth Sinskey (Sidse Babett Knudsen).

Some of the visual scenes were well shot which helped me to stay somewhat engaged with this lackluster movie. I also loved the, from the air, shots of Venice and Istanbul.

With a bad screenplay and poor direction Hanks was as bad as I’ve ever seen him. There just isn’t enough to be interested in or care about with his character. The device of having him slowly get his memory back during the first half of the film was a waste of Hanks’ talent. Jones character was better than Hanks, but I didn’t buy the shift in her role late in the film. It didn’t surprise me and it just didn’t work. Foster was OK as the guy predicting the end of the world. Khan’s role was sufferable and difficult to watch let alone buy. Knudsen was good in her role until it got to the emotional connection with Langdon, that part denigrated the character. Sy’s role didn’t seem defined and was unclear; it didn’t work for me. Ularu was in a poorly constructed and acted role. David Koepp wrote a horribly convoluted screenplay. Ron Howard knows how to direct so I don’t know what went wrong with the film outside of him just doing his best with the presented screenplay.

Overall:  If there is another film in this series I will not go see it.

The Theory of Everything

First Hit: Extremely well-acted and a very engaging story.

Stephen Hawking (played here by Eddie Redmayne) is a brilliant man. His way of viewing our world is ever changing because he continues to open his mind to concepts while having the tenacity to prove things mathematically. Sharing with us, his thoughts through a body that has basically shut down is a story of perseverance and unending support and love from his wife Jane (Felicity Jones).

The film follows the story of Hawking meeting Jane, his learning that he has a motor neuron disease which will slowly disable his physical movement, how Jane’s support allowed him to continue, flourish in the science community, and finally through the end of Jane and Stephen’s marriage and their continued support each other past their divorce.

This film is beautifully shot as the scenes in the house show both havoc and love - amazing.

Redmayne gives an Oscar nomination worthy performance – enough said. Jones is fantastic. I thought she was equally the heart and soul of this film. David Thewlis as Dennis Sciama was great and embodied the man who helped Steven grow and explore his inner universe. Anthony McCarten wrote an excellent screen play from Jane Hawking’s own book “Traveling to Infinity: My Life with Stephen”. James Marsh did a fantastic job of giving us a view into this great man’s life. He did an even better job of giving us a view of how Jane was the base that empowered Stephen.

Overall: This was a wonderful film to watch.