Ready Player One

First Hit: Entertaining visual story into a possible future filled with a decayed reality and virtual fantasy.

Steven Spielberg knows how to create complete stories on the screen. I never leave a Spielberg film with questions, and this film does the same. He always provides a full story. This is one of his strengths and much of the time it is the small details that ties the knot on the bow. Spielberg also knows how to relate with young actors to get the best out of them. However, his obvious strength is the visual rendering of the story in an impressive pictorial way, and he does it again in this film.

This story takes place in 2044 and the world and its resources are falling apart. This is rendered impressively by the vertical stacking of mobile homes in a way that shows both ingenuity of the owners and slum like conditions in which they exist. Most people have given up hope and the few scenes displaying this poverty is enough. To escape their lives, people put on virtual reality (VR) headsets. In their VR world, their lives are given a new level of purpose and dreams. Through their avatars, they can be what they want to be and participate in the games and different worlds as they wish.

Halliday aka Anorak (Mark Rylance) is the creator and maker of the most popular game, Oasis. He’s a bookish man, who does not relate well with people although his business partner Ogden Morrow, aka OG, (Simon Pegg) seems to create a place and space for Halliday to flourish.

Before Halliday’s death, Halliday decides to create a contest that, when a gamer finds the three keys hidden deep within Oasis, the winner will receive the golden egg. This golden egg includes owning and running the company that makes Oasis as well as unfounded riches.

A competitor company IOI (Innovation Online Industries), run by Nolan Sorrento (Ben Mendelsohn), wants the golden egg so that his lagging company can reap the fruits of Halliday’s work. To do so he hires lots of people to be avatars with one goal; to help him find the three keys and to obtain the golden egg.

The film’s main character and hero is Wade Watts, aka Parzival, (Tye Sheridan) who is smart, kind, thoughtful, and an excellent Oasis player. Wade’s parents died years ago and he lives with his aunt and her wildly erratic husband. In the VR world Parsival’s best friend is Aech, aka Helen, (Lena Waithe). On his trek to find the first key, he helps out Art3mis, aka Samantha, (Olivia Cooke). He does this because he thinks her avatar is beautiful and believes they connect at a deeper level.

Together Parzival, Art3mis, and Aech work to solve the puzzle's problems and find the three keys. Along the way they are joined by other players who carry the same ideals.

This film spends more time in the VR mode than reality mode, however the switches between the worlds was done in a wonderful way. The switches make sense. There are also scenes when there is a belief that a character thinks they’re in reality mode, when they aren’t.

The best part is that the team working with Parzival are strong and interesting in both reality and VR modes. Both worlds created by Spielberg are wonderful in that they are realistically flawed and complete. The visuals are not so overladen and overdone that they overwhelm the film and story.

Sheridan was excellent as Parzival, the films main hero. He makes an excellent Clark Kent type character. Waithe as Aech was so much fun. As a male avatar, she was wonderfully strong and compassionate which reflected her deeper reality character as well. Cooke was great as Art3mis. Her bad-ass avatar character belied her reality character of being insecure. Pegg was wonderful as OG and his kindness carried through the film. Rylance was sublime as the quirky, lost, smart creator of Oasis. His social ineptness was perfect. Mendelsohn was very good as the villain running IOI and wanting to be the top dog. Zak Penn and Ernest Cline wrote and engaging screenplay effectively rendered by the inimitable Spielberg.

Overall:  This is a film the audience can sit back and simply enjoy the ride.

The Post

First Hit:  A powerful film about the power of the press to share the truth to the American public and how a woman finds own her power and strength.

People who weren’t born early enough to experience the power of the press in 1971, as depicted in this film, may get a chance to witness this power with today’s political climate.

However, one of the most powerful parts of this film has nothing to do with the press, government secrets, or how the government lied to the public; it has to do with how a woman, Kay (Katharine) Graham (Meryl Streep), found her inner strength and resolve to make a decision that changed history.

Graham grew up privileged, pampered, and cared for. Her life was a world where men, for the most part, ruled the world and roost.

The film opens with her in the throes of finalizing a public offering of The Washington Post's stock. She’s doing this because she's in-charge and the company needs money to survive. When her father died, he'd given control of the paper to her husband who committed suicide which left her in control of the paper.

With a cadre of all male advisors, she is being coached through the steps to make The Post financially stable. However, she struggles to find her words while balancing her social duties as a well-to-do hostess of the Washington elite.

The scene where all the secretaries (that’s what assistants were called then) are gathered in front of the meeting room where she alone would enter a room full of male bankers and other investors, said it all.

As the film unfolds, we get a glimpse of the men she relied on to help her navigate the rough and tumble world of newspapers, the company, and finance. Among the men she works with were her Executive Editor, Ben Bradlee (Tom Hanks), who seems to hold Graham in high regard and encourages her to stand up and take charge. Additionally there was Robert McNamara (Bruce Greenwood) who was Secretary of Defense in the lying Nixon administration and a very close family friend of Graham’s. Then there was Fritz Beebe (Tracy Letts) the Post’s Chairman of the Board, in addition to a few others.

The issue that takes her to task and brings her to the forefront is that The New York Times has a headline written from the stolen Pentagon Papers. These secrets were taken from The Rand Corporation by Daniel Ellsberg (Matthew Rhys). On the same day The Times headlines this information, her paper has Trisha Nixon's wedding as their headline.

Ellsberg had discovered that the government, through a recent study sponsored by McNamara, had been lying to the country about our involvement in Vietnam.

With this exposed, Nixon's Department of Justice sent The New York Times a cease and desist. In the background, Bradlee, hating to be scooped by the Times sent Ben Bagdikian (Bob Odenkirk) to find out how to get a copy of the leaked papers. They contact Ellsberg and get boxes of the original papers and begin to write stories to publish.

The awakening and climax is: Will Katharine publish the papers and risk being shut down by the government? Will it negate the public offering? And, will everyone at The Post lose their jobs? This is where the film really is dynamically excellent. The conversations Katharine has with her daughter Lally (Alison Brie), Bradlee, McNamara, and Letts are beautifully constructed and powerfully executed.

Streep was sublime as a woman discovering and then using her power. The evolution of Graham during this film is exquisite. Hanks is extremely strong in his role of protecting the freedom of the press. Odenkirk is fantastic as the assigned Post reporter to find the papers and get The Post back in the fray. Rhys was excellent as Ellsberg for whom I bow to for taking the risk of losing his freedom to tell US citizens the truth of our government’s deceit. Greenwood was great as McNamara. Serving Nixon and being honest with Graham, his friend, was a difficult task. Letts was strong as The Post’s chairman. He wanted and supported Katharine's growth. Brie was perfect as Graham’s daughter. Her role in the bedroom scene added so much to Katharine’s growth. Liz Hannah and Josh Singer wrote an excellent, inviting, and movingly strong script. Steven Spielberg hasn’t lost his touch to create ways for the audience to become fully engaged with his films. The scenes (living room with the papers strung about, the corporate boardroom, the rumbling of the presses starting up shaking the upstairs desks) are typical Spielberg, full, complete, and excellent. However, it was coaxing excellent performances where his ability to work with actors that shined most.

Overall:  This film is perfect for the times; the growing strength of women and holding our government accountable.

The BFG 3D

First Hit:  Spielberg knows how to craft a fantastic visual film experience through a wonderful story.

There is no doubt that Steven Spielberg is an ultimate craftsman. The detail in each scene is both amazingly complete and helps the audience’s mind embrace the story without question.

That the BFG (Mark Rylance) was slightly pigeon-toed as was Sophie (Ruby Barnhill) is an example. Then, watch Sophie’s cat move, the detail and realism is perfect. Look at items in the BFG's home - so precise while adding to the sense and feel of it being his real home.

However, the crowning achievement of Spielberg's ability is the performance he gets out of Barnhill. Just as he did with Drew Barrymore in ET, he coaxes thoughtful, honest childlike thinking, age appropriate dialog and incredible realism.

I was hard pressed to believe that many of her lines were scripted, they were so perfectly spoken and her facial expressions so mesmerizing, I bought her belief hook, line, and sinker.

Although I thought the film dragged a bit in the middle and was taking longer than needed to unfold this story; it kept me engaged, laughing, and wondering where it was going in a great and wonderful way.

Barnhill was fantastic and sublime as Sophie, a girl who believed in the BFG and his goodness. Rylance was wonderful as the BFG. His version of clumsy witty movement and behavior was extraordinary. Penelope Wilton was wonderful as The Queen of England. Rebecca Hall as Mary, The Queens right hand person, was very strong as well. Melissa Mathison wrote a wonderful screenplay filled with insight, struggle, and joy. Spielberg is a master and proves it once again.

Overall:  This was a wonderfully entertaining film that glowed for hours afterwards

Bridge of Spies

First Hit:  The difference between Spielberg films and other director films is always attention detail through craftsmanship – this film excels in every way.

When a film supplies and fulfills details around my childhood memories and does it with great storytelling, I’m hooked.

I remember the cold war. We use to practice diving under our desks and covering our necks with our hands in case “The Bomb” went off. We were told, we’d see the flashing light of the bomb in LA (I grew up in Southern California) and when we did see the flash we were to "drop, duck and cover".

The way Spielberg crafts the era and the story of three men, Rudolf Able (Mark Rylance) accused Russian spy, high altitude U2 surveillance pilot Francis Gary Powers (Austin Stowell) and lawyer turned negotiator James B. Donovan (Tom Hanks) was sublime.

The director takes his time, gives the audience relevant information, and then crafts a story that is interesting and fully engaging. Every scene is crafted to share an emotion or add to the audience’s understanding of story. The CIA agent following Able when the camera moves around the car to introduce the suspicion – perfect.

The story is about how an insurance lawyer, Donovan, is hired by the US Government to first defend Able in the US Court of law and then he’s recruited to negotiate a prisoner swap. The swap was for Powers who was a U2 pilot that was shot down over Russia. Because we were in the midst of the cold war with Russia neither government would acknowledge that they were talking with each other.

The feel of East Berlin, where the swap happened, was perfectly dreary. The relevant side story was that Donovan wanted an additional person included in the trade, Fredrick Pryor (Will Rogers). In this side story Pryor, a student, had gotten caught on the wrong side of the wall and was being used by the East Germans to make a name for their government. It also showed the strength of conviction of Donovan to get what he wanted, to be a humanitarian and how good he was at negotiating.

My favorite line spoken a few times in the film was:  “Would it help?”

Hanks was superb. He’ll probably be nominated for an award during award season. I would also say that Rylance was equally superb in his supporting role. He’s perfect and his ability to portray a subdued man on a mission who can be trusted is brilliant. Stowell was good as the U2 pilot. Matt Charman, Ethan and Joel Coen wrote a compelling, interesting engaging story, but it was Spielberg’s direction through clear vision that makes this film absolutely great.

Overall:  This is a perfect slice of history presented in a way that is simply great storytelling.

Lincoln

First Hit:  Fantastic acting in a wonderful slice of Americana.

I was overwhelmingly amused that we had just finished an election where the Republican Party devastatingly lost its credibility and mojo while this film showed Republicans at their finest.

Make no bones about it; Lincoln’s Co-Republican group were what drove the 13th Amendment into the law of the land while Democrats floundered in a generic stupidity of beliefs. Who learned from this lesson – the Democrats and it was the Democrats that brought our first black President back for a second term.

In Lincoln the focus is on a short few months from when he was elected to a second term until his assassination. Lincoln’s task was to ensure the freedom of blacks in America before the ending of the Civil War.

His premise was that if the war ended prior to passing the 13th Amendment, this law would fall by the wayside and blacks wouldn’t have their deserved freedom. Daniel Day-Lewis plays Lincoln as a thoughtful complex intelligent man whose single-minded focus kept the Republican dream alive.

He cared not so much for what was on the outside, but what was in a person's heart and what was right. Wife Mary (played by Sally Field) was, in this time of her life, grief stricken by the loss of one of their sons and despite her strength and intelligence was prone to fits of despair over loss. 

Day-Lewis is extraordinary and will certainly get an Oscar nod for his portrayal of Lincoln. He embodied the drive to create equality for the blacks in America. Field was strangely complex and powerful in her role as Marry Todd Lincoln. David Strathairn was pointedly strong and loyal as William Seward, Secretary of State. Tommy Lee Jones was amazing and perfect as Thaddeus Stevens the long time proponent of the 13th Amendment. Jackie Earle Haley was great as Alexander Stevens the Southern States representative during negotiations with Lincoln. Tony Kushner wrote a powerful and compelling screenplay while Steven Spielberg delivered a Oscar worthy turn as director.

Overall: If Republicans want to get their mojo back they need to watch and learn from this film – the Democrats obviously learned through history.