Arrival (2016)

You may have noticed that I have this tendency to compare compelling science fiction to Inception. In fact, in the case of Big Hero 6, Looper, and Transcendence, I usually draw a straight line back to 2010. This inclination, I admit, is somewhere between hagiography and tracking cultural influence, for few will deny that I am a disciple of Christopher Nolan and that the post-2010 science-fiction line-up does have a lot in common with Inception.

However, I’m not going to say that Arrival has much to do with Inception. (Nor am I going to spoil anything, promise.) Instead, I’m going to draw the connective tissue a little closer to the present, toward Nolan’s most recent film. Arrival is essentially a moody, Kubrickian Interstellar, without much in common with Inception beyond the same pleasant mental gymnastics as we follow along with the film’s very smart plot.

Amy Adams stars as Dr. Louise Banks, a linguistic professor whose loose affiliation with the United States government puts her at the top of the list when twelve alien spacecraft arrive on earth. Drafted to help translate an alien language in order to understand the spacecrafts’ purpose on our planet, Dr. Banks works with a theoretical physicist (Jeremy Renner) and a wary colonel (Forest Whitaker) to piece together the mystery of the arrival.

Not just because both films utilize Max Richter’s “On the Nature of Daylight” to great effect (and affect), there are parts of Arrival that feel very much like Martin Scorsese’s underrated Shutter Island (perhaps not coincidentally, also 2010, a real important year for me as a filmgoer). Somewhere between Arrival’s fog-bound aesthetic and its depiction of resilient optimism in the face of a crumbling world, a belief that ultimately things will make sense if we study them hard enough, I was reminded of Shutter Island and its similarly determined worldview. In both films, we have a “detective” of sorts, whose dogged pursuit of a graspable truth – in whose existence very few of the other characters actually believe – plays out amid dreary weather and mournful violin solos which suggest the intangibility of truth and the inherent sorrow therein. However, in Arrival as in Shutter Island, the truth is out there, if only we had eyes to see it.

In Arrival, those eyes belong to Louise Banks, and thank heavens we have Amy Adams to play the part. In a just world, Adams would be in the running for Best Actress, because her portrayal of the linguist is stunning and powerful, conveying much with a frown or a furrowed brow, and her earnest desire to understand the aliens is something that comes through even as we see just how scared she is of the possibilities presented by life beyond our little blue world. We have all these other dudes in the film – and yes, Adams is pretty much the only woman in the film, which can’t be accidental – but they take a backseat to Adams’s performance.

For as small and intimate as the film’s focus is on Louise Banks, the film has a simultaneous grandeur to it that recalls Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). The twelve alien ships, several stories high and hovering above the ground, recall Kubrick’s black monolith, suggesting perhaps shared common ground in both films’ treatment of mankind’s future and our place among the stars. There are moments in Arrival that feel a bit as though Stanley Kubrick is directing an adaptation of Wuthering Heights in which Heathcliff is an immense being at which we can only marvel, slack-jawed, while we attempt to comprehend. But where Brontë left Heathcliff somewhat inscrutable, where Kubrick might have left him to the dimension of the metaphorical, Arrival takes the occasion of immensity as a moment of contemplation. Louise begins in fear of the aliens, but track her evolution throughout the film.

Arrival isn’t a puzzle box like Inception, where we have to struggle mightily to keep up. Rather, it’s more akin to the scientific affect of Interstellar, in which mystery elements fit together thematically, not solely by virtue of their ability to clear up the plot. Rather than comprehend, we understand; we feel it. Arrival has a depth to it, a sense of truth and a very valuable point about geopolitics and the need for a utopian perspective. Louise Banks has that utopian vision, that belief that her work has purpose, direction, and possibility, where others see only futility and predetermination. It’s to the film’s credit that it convinces us to see things her way, and in a brilliant third-act reveal, teaches us how to do it, too.

Director Denis Villenueve – we at The Cinema King remember him fondly from Prisoners – is slated to direct the forthcoming Blade Runner 2049, and while I’ve never thought that film needed a sequel, seeing Villenueve at the helm of a compelling and grand science fiction film has me rethinking my tune.

Arrival is rated PG-13 for “brief strong language.” Directed by Denis Villenueve. Written by Eric Heisserer. Based on the short story “Story of Your Life” by Ted Chiang. Starring Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Forest Whitaker, Michael Stuhlbarg, and Tzi Ma.

American Hustle (2013)

Last year David O. Russell snuck in at the tail end of the calendar with Silver Linings Playbook, a romantic comedy that reinstilled my belief in the genre; two years earlier, he’d caught my eye with The Fighter.  And with American Hustle, Russell takes the things that worked best in those movies – namely the remarkable acting talent on display – and mashes them together for a thoroughly enjoyable Oscar contender.

Based loosely on a true story – “Some of this actually happened,” an opening title card boasts – American Hustle gives us con artist Irving Rosenfeld (Christian Bale in another total body transformation) and his lover/partner Sydney “Edith” Prosser (Amy Adams) as they are forced into a federal corruption investigation led by FBI Agent Richie DiMaso (Bradley Cooper).  As the investigation bears unexpected fruit with Camden Mayor Carmine Polito (Jeremy Renner) in the crosshairs, Irving’s reckless wife Rosalyn (Jennifer Lawrence) puts her husband in jeopardy while trying to keep her marriage safe.

I almost don’t need to say much about the cast; they’re all exceptionally solid choices, the best performers from Russell’s two previous films under one roof.  As the lead (and hopefully a Best Actor candidate), Bale is almost unrecognizable were it not for his remarkable talent, and Adams demonstrates herself a perfect foil for him, continuing to break out of that “too cute for words” mode into which she might have been typecast after Enchanted.  Renner and Cooper are reliably compelling, and Lawrence continues to hold onto that “most talented young actress” title with a powerhouse performance as the spirited Rosalyn.  All handle the naturalistic dialogue very well, with improvisational quirks and touches that give the film a lived-in feel.  We come to know these people very well, thanks to the life given by the cast.

Even better than these five thrown into the same pot – plus all the supporting roles, including Louis CK as Cooper’s boss and a delightful uncredited cameo by a real legend – is the sum of the parts.  American Hustle is at once blissfully engaging and wildly unpredictable.  I don’t want to say it’s something we’ve never seen before; indeed, for many reasons it feels very much like an update on Scorsese’s Goodfellas.  But American Hustle manages to feel quite fresh, playing fast and loose with the historical facts (happily for those who know the story and those who don’t) in order to create an elaborately twisty narrative that takes its characters in surprising and entertaining directions.

All the while, Russell keeps us guessing by refusing to spoonfeed us character motivation, even with the presence of voiceover narration.  Rather than spell out plot beats and character traits, the voiceover instead fills us in on the personalities of the characters and, more importantly, the moments when we know they’re lying to themselves.  The narrative of the film is highly concerned with questions of honesty and deception, and Russell wisely plays about in it without handing us easy moral judgments.  The number of double- and triple-crosses are quite successful on an aesthetic level and satisfying on an interpretive one because we’re never expecting them.  Of course, in a movie about deception, we’ll have characters deceiving each other, but Russell manages to avoid the clichéd “gotcha” beats and instead continually sucker-punches the audience with another new twist introduced with graceful subtlety (as when we learn a key character actually can speak Arabic or when Rosalyn lets slip once or twice).

American Hustle is a movie that will leave its audience reeling, first from the sheer volume of thespianic talent on display and then from the intricate and enthralling plot structure which Russell uses to say insightful things about the problem of honesty and self-deceit.  The original title of the film was American Bulls—t, a title which would have been deliciously ironic – there’s no worse comparison to make with this film than a comparison to excrement.  American Hustle is the exact opposite – delightfully fun, solid gold.

American Hustle is rated R “for pervasive language, some sexual content and brief violence.”  The characters use the F-word quite a lot, a few adulterous affairs occur on-screen (with maybe a possible flicker of female nudity in one), and there’s a death-by-gunshot and a few minor fistfights.  Aside from the language, this one is really close to a PG-13.

Man of Steel (2013)

Tall order, Zack Snyder:  direct the heck out of a Superman movie so we can move toward a Justice League franchise while we forget entirely about Superman Returns.

Mission accomplished.

After a dynamite Krypton scene introducing the coolest Jor-El (Russell Crowe) this side of Brando, we catch up with Kal-El (Henry Cavill) on a journey of self-discovery – until star reporter Lois Lane (Amy Adams) finds him first.  But before the man who will become Superman can reveal himself to the world, the mad General Zod (Michael Shannon) arrives and demands to reclaim Kal-El and the Kryptonian race.

I always feel a bit starstruck writing these reviews for movies I went into expecting to like.  It’s a Superman movie godfathered by Christopher Nolan:  I’m admittedly biased here.  So if you like, take a grain of salt to go with this review.  But while I’m less agog than I was at The Dark Knight or its Rises successor, I’m prepared to say I liked Man of Steel better than Batman Begins, a “first film” with which it shares many similarities.

The first of these is the film’s smart emphasis on the man before the Superman.  As with Bruce Wayne in Begins, we care about Kal-El as a character caught between two worlds without feeling at home in either.  And it’s on Cavill’s able shoulders that the film rests; tasked with playing Kal-El (not heroic Superman, not geeky performance Clark Kent), Cavill gives us a compelling and engaging protagonist who we actually appreciate for his complexity.  Watch the moment when Kal confronts a belligerent trucker; the simmer is there, and the punchline reaction is pitch perfect.

The rest of the cast is stellar, too – no complaints about Adams or Shannon, who both turn in reliably solid work; Adams is spunky and darling as Lois Lane, and no one does crazy-angry like Michael Shannon, whose Zod is a megalomaniacal ball of fury who never descends into caricature.  The real surprises, though, are the gripping performances of Russell Crowe and Kevin Costner as Kal’s two fathers; Crowe makes Jor-El interesting beyond Brando’s stuffed shirt (seriously, can we get a Jor-El prequel?), and Costner is moving to the point of misty eyes as the weathered all-American Pa Kent.  Better still, we can see how these two parents informed the man Kal becomes, partly through the flashback structure of the film (again, Batman Begins) and also through Cavill’s interactions with them.  (As Ma Kent, Diane Lane gets just enough screentime, though one suspects she’ll have a larger role in the sequel.)

Finally, major major kudos go to Hans Zimmer, the stalwart composer of some of the best blockbusters of the past decade.  Zimmer manages to sidestep the issue of the iconic John Williams score by giving us a rousing and optimistic theme that soars with the protagonist, booms with Zod’s invasion, and actually – unlike his early Batman stuff – gets stuck in your head.  Equal parts Batman, Pirates, and Inception, Zimmer’s Man of Steel score sets the stage for what ought to be a stellar Justice League jam.

And yes, the build-up toward Justice League is acutely felt, even though the stage is entirely Superman’s (eyes open for nods to Wayne Enterprises and Lexcorp).  What we’ve got in the meantime is a thoroughly engaging cross between the fanboy fidelity of Zack Snyder (see Watchmen, slavishly so) and the relentless realism of Christopher Nolan.  The film does, as Eddie Izzard would say, do a bit of “pissing about with the myth” (too many people might know Superman’s secret identity, and Superman makes a controversial climactic decision which I suspect sets up a sequel), but this original take on the classic character ought to leave plenty of fans satisfied.  And from the box office receipts, mainstream moviegoers are pretty pleased, too.

Heck, Man of Steel doesn’t say it in the title, but it’s super.

Man of Steel is rated PG-13 for “intense sequences of sci-fi violence, action and destruction, and for some language.”  Some of the action/fight scenes are relentless, lasting dozens of minutes at a time.  They’re almost entirely bloodless (Kryptonians apparently don’t bleed), though some have been distressed by the apparent 9/11 allegory at work.  Lois Lane has a few mildly salty lines, but they’re more endearing than offensive.

Tuesday at the Movies - April 30, 2013

Welcome to this week’s edition of “Monday at the Movies,” coming at you via Tuesday due to unavoidable circumstances (or, to be more precise, circumstances I chose not to avoid).  Before our summer blockbuster coverage begins, we take a moment for one of the strangest Oscar-nominated films from last year.

The Master (2012) – After crafting There Will Be Blood, an unexpectedly riveting drama about an oil man and his tense relations with his adopted son and a flimflam preacher, Paul Thomas Anderson (PT to his admirers, a nod to the Barnum Circus of attractions) is on my shortlist of directors to watch no matter what.  The Master is a baffling film, cryptic even when it’s not trying, but it’s a captivating watch that doesn’t fail to enthrall.  Joaquin Phoenix stars as drifter Freddie Quell, whose latest bender leads him into the path of mysterious cult leader Lancaster Dodd (Philip Seymour Hoffman).  Captivated by Freddie, Dodd begins to alter the practices of “The Cause,” a thinly-veiled Scientology allegory whose promises of enlightenment are never quite clear.  What is clear is that Dodd’s wife Peggy (Amy Adams as the not-so-sweet matriarch) is growing weary of Freddie’s company.  That’s all quite upfront, but much of the movie raises questions – How much of this is real?  What does it mean?  What is “The Cause”?  Much of the fun of the movie comes not from discovering the answers but from thinking through the questions with the movie.  And while the script is aloof in a David Lynch sort of way, the performances are compelling beyond requirement, more than earning those Oscar nods; Phoenix disappears behind Freddie Quell, down to the posture and squint of a damaged man.  And Hoffman is stellar as always; indeed, I’m not convinced Christoph Waltz was better in Django Unchained, especially after Hoffman’s eerie incantation of “Slow Boat to China” or his stubborn insistence on the rectitude of The Cause.  But don’t let the comparison to Lynch put you off; The Master is a film that will leave sighing breathlessly – not for perplexity at the disconnects but for exhaustion from probing those lacunae.  In fact, I’m certain The Master requires multiple viewings for full comprehension, but you need only one to know that Anderson is as much the master as Lancaster Dodd.

That does it for this week’s edition of “Monday at the Movies.” We’ll see you here next week for Iron Man 3!