Richard Jewell

First Hit: Outstanding film and portrayal of a man who went through hell because of the FBI and the malfeasance of a newspaper reporter.

I so bought into Richard Jewell’s character as portrayed by Paul Walter Hauser. He was terrific and gave me a real sense of a man who really tried hard to follow the rule of law and be someone people could count on to protect them.

This is based on a true story about Richard Jewell, who was pretty much a loner, lived with his mother Bobi (Kathy Bates), and wanted to be part of the law enforcement community all his life.

When we first engage with Jewell, he’s a supply clerk in a company and we see that he is thoughtful and careful about his work. We are shown this as he overhears a loud, aggressive telephone conversation by Watson Bryant (Sam Rockwell) and a client of the company they work for.

Apologizing for overhearing the conversation (there’s no way he couldn’t hear), he tells Watson to look in a drawer because Jewell has filled it with the pens Watson uses in his work. Also, asking Bryant to open another drawer, it is filled with Snickers candy bars, the snack food Bryant eats when stressed.

Through this interchange, they become acquaintances and chat from time to time. One day Jewell gets a job offer to be a security guard at a local college campus. Jewell’s goodbye to Bryant is very sweet. Bryant, caught off guard, gives him a $100 bill in case he might need anything during the transition between jobs. Jewell is touched, and for him, their friendship is now rock-solid.

At his new job, he has a run-in with some students who are breaking campus rules and he gets fired for this and because he’s overstepping his bounds by stopping cars on the highway near the campus looking for drugs.

These things highlight a couple of things about Jewell. He believes in following the rules, and he can and will step outside the bounds of his authority.

Jewell finally gets a security guard job at AT&T’s events at Centennial Park which are part of the celebrations for the 1996 Atlanta, GA Olympics. His thoughtfulness and kindness are highlighted here, as well. He provides water or Coca Cola to pregnant women so that they do not become dehydrated, and he also supplies the lighting and filming crew in the nearby tower with food or other things they need. He wants to be helpful.

He’s also looking for suspicious items and people. When he discovers a backpack that has been left under a bench where he was sitting, he tells the police. The police team brings in some experts and they realize it is a bomb. While moving the crowd back, the bomb explodes, and two people are killed, and many others are injured.

At first, he’s seen as a hero and is on television. He’s proud of his work, and his mother is especially pleased because her favorite newscaster, Tom Brokaw, spoke glowingly about her son.

FBI Agent Tom Shaw (Jon Hamm) was also stationed at the park and is disappointed that he was stationed there, and even worse, something happened on his watch, and he didn’t prevent it. After interviewing Jewell’s past records and after meeting with the college who fired Jewell, Richard becomes a suspect. What does Jewell do when he realizes the FBI is considering him a suspect? He calls Bryant.

Local newspaper columnist Kathy Scruggs (Olivia Wilde), who only wants to make a name for herself, uses her sexuality towards Shaw to extract this FBI probe about Jewell. She writes an unconfirmed expose front-page article in the newspaper, and in a New York minute, it jumps up to become national headlines.

Now Jewell is seen as the vilified criminal, not the hero, all in a span of about a week.

The film then tells the story of how his friendship with Bryant and the undying support of his mom, and longtime friend Brandon Walker (Mike Pniewski) help him through the onslaught of the rush-to-judgment people – the FBI and Media.

I did find it interesting that this film has come out when both the FBI and the Media are under a public spotlight and scrutiny.

Hauser needs to receive an Oscar nomination for his portrayal of Jewell. He was terrific in bringing this confused, caring man to life. His sincerity, thoughtfulness, and helpfulness (even at the wrong times) are excellently portrayed. Rockwell gives yet another robust and stunning performance as Jewell’s friend and attorney. His sarcasm and pointed jabs at the FBI’s flawed work were excellent. Hamm was good, but it would be nice to see him in a role where drinking and sex are not his only motivation. Wilde was all over the place and enjoyable as Scruggs, who clearly had only one thing on her mind, fame. Bates was terrific as Jewell’s mother. Her demonstration of faith in her son and that he wasn’t who people were making him out to be, was sublime. Nina Arlanda, as Watson Bryant’s office manager and friend, Nadya Light, brought a beautiful blend of humor and persistence to Bryant’s actions. Billy Ray wrote an outstanding screenplay that was crisp and painted each character entirely. Clint Eastwood did an excellent job of directing this story. He is usually efficient in telling stories and here he stepped it up a notch.

Overall: This was a wonderfully entertaining film and brought to life a story I read about some twenty-three years ago.

Stan & Ollie

First Hit: This is an outstanding, beautiful, love story about how two men spent their lives together making audiences laugh.

Like a married couple, Stan Laurel (Steve Coogan) and Oliver Hardy (John C. Reilly) spent years of their lives together. In that time together, their bond of respect and friendship developed while on the road doing shows and making films making people laugh.

This film begins with the men doing a scene for a movie in their heyday. They are kibitzing in a trailer talking about the number of marriages Oliver had, all the money he had to give to these ex-wives, and his love for the ponies. The scene they shoot is one of their favorite dance routines, and it is a sight to behold.

Stan, on the other hand, was always working, writing, and thinking of gags for the duo to use in their films or stage act. As they enter the set to shoot a scene, Stan wants Oliver and himself to start their own production company because they do all the work and manager-producer Hal Roach (Danny Huston) and the film company is making all the money. Stan can get out of his contract, but Oliver cannot. They split up.

We see a brief scene where Oliver does a movie (“the elephant film”) with someone else.

The film then shifts to sixteen years later, and they are in their sixties. Their old movies still show in theaters, but few people see them, and they receive no royalties for their work. They both need money and Stan, who has never stopped working, is attempting to get financing together for a Laurel & Hardy film version of Robin Hood. To help them finance the film and to demonstrate their draw, they decide to tour England, Ireland, and Scotland to drum up interest. The hope is that the possible financier will see them in a London show.

The tour starts slowly, and they play tiny second-rate houses, stay in second-rate hotels, and the crowds are small. However, the people who do come to the shows, love them. Harry Landon (Richard Cant), their tour organizer decide they have to do some promotional newsreels. So, the film shows them promoting their shows and all of a sudden, the theaters are packed and their playing in front of audiences of 2,000.

When they reach London their respective wives, Lucille Hardy (Shirley Henderson) and Ida Kitaeva Laurel (Nina Arlanda) show up to see the big show in one of London’s most prominent theaters.

Lucille and Ida are a hoot together and separately as they are very different people and care about their husbands differently. However, the tour has been tough on both, especially Oliver. His weight challenges his heart, and his ability to move has been difficult. Then the underlying animosity, because Oliver did a film without Stan, comes out in a public argument.

Oliver has a mild heart attack and decides to retire. Stan tries to go on with a British replacement, but he cannot, it’s not Oliver, his partner, friend, and original cohort.

As the film winds up, Stan and Oliver do one more show and do their dance routine, it is sublime and brought such joy to my heart watching them.

Reilly was amazing. His expressions and ability to be Oliver Hardy was beyond anything I thought he could do. I was transported to 1957 as a little boy laughing out loud watching Laurel and Hardy on our black and white television. Coogan was equally fantastic as Stan Laurel. His routines, the one with the egg, were sublime. Arlanda and Henderson, Laurel and Hardy’s respective wives, were hilarious. I loved watching them snipe at each other and then, when watching their husbands’ last show, holding hands. Huston was superb as Hal Roach as was Cant in his role. Jeff Pope wrote a divine script. Jon S. Baird took this script and these amazing actors and made superb, finely crafted film.

Overall: I thoroughly enjoyed watching this film and would watch it again.

Midnight in Paris

First Hit: A wonderful and tightly shot film that is both satisfying and enjoyable.

Woody Allen has found a wonderful male vehicle to speak his lines and play the part he would have probably liked to play.

Owen Wilson was outstanding as Gil a successful Hollywood script writer in Paris with his fiancée Inez (played by Rachel McAdams). They're in Paris because they’ve “tagged along” with her very conservative rich parents. Gil makes good money as a film script writer which is probably the only reason why her parents John and Helen (played by Kurt Fuller and Mimi Kennedy) tolerate Gil.

As a writer Gil is frustrated because he wants to be a great writer of books but suffers from confidence. While dining one evening they run into Paul and Carol (played by Michael Sheen and Nina Arianda) some friends of hers. Paul’s pompous style, her parents, and Paris pushes Gil to dream about what it might have been like to be a writer in Paris in 1940 or what he sees as the golden age.

At midnight one night an old car pulls up, one of the occupants pulls him in, and they go to a party. At first he thinks he’s fallen into a costume party because there was F. Scott Fitzgerald, Zelda Fitzgerald, and Cole Porter. But as the evening rolls along he discovers that he really is with these people and he’s been transported back in time to another era, his golden age.

Each night at midnight he waits, the car pulls up, he gets in and meets new and interesting people, like Hemingway, Dali, Josephine Baker, Luis Bunuel, and Gertrude Stein who promises to read his novel and give him some feedback. He also meets and falls in love with Adriana (played by Marion Cotillard) who is having an affair with Picasso.

One of the funnier scenes is during an art tour with Paul and Carol, Gil corrects the know-it-all Paul about a Picasso painting because the night before he spent the evening with Picasso, Adriana (whom the painting represents), and Hemingway discussing this very painting. As Gil becomes increasingly attracted to Paris, his golden age, and Adriana he begins to re-think his priorities with Inez and her family.

But the real question Allen puts before the audience is that often people think of another time, other than the time they are in, as the golden age they'd would have liked to been born in. But the fact is that where you are now is your time and it is what you do with it that counts. Here Allen exceeds, his point is made, because this film makes the point with fun, flair, beautiful scenes, wonderful characters, and excellent writing.

Wilson is perfect as Allen’s representative of his story line. Some of Wilson’s best acting ever. McAdams is good as the entitled spoiled fiancée. Fuller and Kennedy are great as the money and society obsessed parents of Inez. Sheen is particularly perfect as the self-obsessed arrogant know-it-all. Cotillard is excellent as Adriana the woman who can steal the hearts of men in a moment. All of the actors playing the great artists of the past of the past were outstanding. Allen wrote a brilliant screenplay while directing this cast with the sure handedness of a master at his craft. One thing to note, is that Allen proves that a film maker can tell a wonderful complex story in under 90 minutes. This film represents the joy of crisp clear storytelling in film.

Overall: This is a wonderful and enjoyable film and it will transport you and ensure you think along the way.