Into the Woods (2014)

I had so desperately wanted to begin this review with the fabulous line given to Little Red Riding Hood:  “Nice is different than good.”  Unfortunately for the sake of the pun, Into the Woods is both nice and good, a fine close to what has been another good year for Disney and perhaps the more sober alternative to the relentless cheeriness of the nation’s current Frozen mania.

The film’s opener sets the stage best:  “Once upon a time in a far-off kingdom there lay a small village at the edge of the woods, and in this village lived a young maiden (Anna Kendrick as Cinderella), a carefree young lad (Daniel Huttlestone as the bean-stalked Jack), and a childless baker (James Corden) with his wife (Emily Blunt).”  The curse of a witch (Meryl Streep) sets these characters into a quest through the woods, where they cross paths with Little Red Riding Hood (Lilla Crawford), a pair of narcissistic princes (Chris Pine and Billy Magnussen), and a Big Bad Wolf (Johnny Depp).

As someone unfamiliar with the stage play – and deliberately so, in order to take the film on its own terms – I can’t help but see Into the Woods as another fabulous step forward for Disney in its current phase of self-reflexive reinvention.  Those who don’t know the play might be surprised, as I was, by the film’s clever fake-out climax which delivers the “happily ever after” about forty minutes too early and then dissects just how untenable that ending would have been – warts, discontents, and unfinished business.  It’s smart stuff, the kind of revisionist fairy tale that we’re seeing played out in stuff like the Fables comics and, more closely to Into the Woods, the true-love fallacies of Frozen and Brave.

As for the lyrical elephant in the room, Stephen Sondheim’s trademark syncopated style of “talk singing” isn’t for everyone, and even folks who liked Tim Burton’s Sweeney Todd adaptation from a few years back will find Into the Woods somewhat less melodic, governed more by motifs than catchy tunes.  For me, I liked the music enough to go out in search of the soundtrack, if only for the tour de force “Prologue,” a fifteen-minute introduction to all the characters and major plots that also gives us the whimsical eponymous chorus “Into the woods / It’s time to go...”

I like the music, but I’m sure it’s because the performers are all quite charismatic.  I can’t think of many actresses who could sell a line like “I caught him in the autumn in my garden one night!” – but, as the oft-quoted line from Modern Family goes, “Meryl Streep could play Batman and be the right choice.”  Streep, who did Mamma Mia! with more class than anyone expected, lends the Witch an equal dose of class, and she does wonders with the maternal scenes with Rapunzel as well as absolutely killing it in the witchier bits.  I honestly don’t have a bad word about any of the aforementioned cast, although I’ll throw in the two-cents that I really could have used more Johnny Depp.  Touted as a centerpiece of the ensemble cast, Depp only appears for about five minutes – which are captivating, don’t get me wrong, with his vaguely pedophilic Wolf devouring scenery and children in one fell gulp.

I think the reason I fell so fast in love with Into the Woods, aside from the equally captive audience sharing the theater with me, is that the characters are very well-crafted and – tragically, a rarity these days – eminently likeable.  Everyone, from the Baker and his wife to Red Riding Hood, has a story arc, compelling motivations, and at least one ingenious turn of phrase (either by smart rhyme or admirable manipulation of rhythm).  When things don’t go well for them, the audience feels it; when the characters triumph, we feel it even more.  This is a musical adaptation that remembers those of us who don’t already love the story, so director Rob Marshall works extra hard to get all of us swept away by the once-upon-a-times.

And while I’m on the subject of the captive audience, Into the Woods is an effortless crowd pleaser, even amid a somewhat gloomy ending.  There’s something for everyone in here, plenty of year-end spectacle and spectacular performances:  “It Takes Two” is a catchy and slyly romantic duet, where “Agony” is the musical number that’ll elicit the most laughs as the Princes compare male-privilege sorrows.  Into the Woods manages to be self-reflexive without being overtly cynical – “Careful the tale you tell” seems to be the moral of this story, and it’s evident that the filmmakers have been very careful indeed.  What more can I say?  I had an infectiously good time, escapism layered with enough narrative criticality not to feel like a brain-drain.  I’d happily go back into the woods once more.

Into the Woods is rated PG for “thematic elements, fantasy action and peril, and some suggestive material.”  There’s fairy-tale discussion of curses and creatures, though the film darkens considerably in the second half when a giantess walks the earth and several characters die in emotionally-charged sequences.  The Wolf is played as a metaphor for sexual awakening with pedophilic overtones, while the Prince’s philandering ways lead to serious questions about seduction and fidelity.  All told, though, this is no less appropriate than most of, say, Disney’s late-90s offerings.

Monday at the Movies - March 24, 2014

Welcome to another edition of “Monday at the Movies.” This week, a less than unfortunate flick.

Lemony Snickey’s A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004) – Midway through my recent binge-reading (can this be a thing?) of the thirteen books in the series, I stepped aside for a few hours with the film, which loosely adapts the first three books (The Bad Beginning, The Reptile Room, and The Wide Window).  The film and its source material find the Baudelaire orphans (Emily Browning as inventive Violet, Liam Aiken as bookish Klaus, and their baby sister Sunny) bounced from guardian to guardian after their parents perish in a fire.  The first guardian, Count Olaf (Jim Carrey), turns out to be a cad of many costumes; the third, Aunt Josephine (Meryl Streep) is a paranoid whackadoo ruled by her fears.  In between is the kind herpetologist Uncle Monty (Billy Connolly), a character who gets far too little screen time in contrast to his zanier counterparts.  The elephant in the room is Carrey; he’s at his best when he’s restrained (as in The Truman Show), but here his penchant for plasticity plays well with the character’s own fondness for disguises.  Each disguise Count Olaf dons is transparent, but it’s fun to see Carrey step behind Olaf’s theatricality and inhabit these alternate takes on the character (i.e., the meek Stephano or the gruff Captain Sham).  The three Baudelaires are mostly fine, though the film curiously steps away from Violet’s distinctive hair ribbon and Klaus’s definitive glasses.  But one of the most fun bits in the film is what I’ve always held as the cinephile’s true delight – a cast of celebrity cameos, including Streep and Connolly, of course, but also Timothy Spall, Craig Ferguson, and Dustin Hoffman doing his best Stan Lee impression.  Ultimately, the film feels a lot like a Tim Burton film – the best way, I suppose, to describe Snicket’s distinctive prose voice – but as a Burton fan and an admirer of the books, Lemony Snicket’s was engaging enough.  If only the film told us who Beatrice was!

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

It's Complicated (2009)

If Alec Baldwin had a fan club, I'd join it. If Meryl Streep had a fan club, I'd join it. If Steve Martin had a fan club... well, I'm not sure I'd join it, but I'd at least leaf through the literature. It's not complicated to understand, then, why I rented It's Complicated.

Jake (Baldwin) and Jane (Streep) Adler have been divorced for ten years, but there's no animosity between them; Jake's remarried, and Jane runs a bakery. When the meet up at their youngest son's graduation, amicable turns to amorous when the two begin to carry on an affair, telling themselves it's not completely wrong. Aside from the complicating factor that Jake is married to a much younger woman, Jane's starting to fall for her architect, fellow divorcee Adam (Martin). It's love soup, and it's complicated.

A movie like this needs to be grounded by strong performances for it to have any chance of success, and on that count It's Complicated scores two out of three (which, if the Meat Loaf song is to be believed, ain't bad). Baldwin and Streep are at the tops of their respective games; Streep is entirely believable as the conflicted Jane, and Baldwin is uproariously entertaining as lothario Jake. The two have fantastic chemistry, so it's not difficult to believe the two were ever married, nor is it a stretch to understand why they'd want to get back together. Martin has some chemistry with Streep, too, but it's nothing compared to the way Baldwin commands the screen. Of the two Adlers, Baldwin is slightly better in It's Complicated, since he's just that little bit funnier. Every scene he's in found me grinning like an idiot; once he actually did something, then the laughter began. Little quirks like the ones that have made him uber-famous on 30 Rock abound here, making him the star of the show, even if as third-billed he has to steal it. Martin is weaker than the other two here, but this is a recurring theme for him; like Nicolas Cage, Steve Martin seems to have run out of creative steam - that is, if The Pink Panther is any indication. (Exhibit A, your honor)

Fortunately, Martin's not in it all that much, and a terrific supporting role by John "Jim from The Office" Krasinski forms an effective substitute in the laugh quotient. For each scene Steve Martin has in which he is not funny - indeed, often he comes off as entirely pathetic, schleppy in a way that makes Patrick Wilson look like Humphrey Bogart - Krasinski is hilarious, having honed his comedic timing on primetime NBC. Krasinski plays son-in-law-to-be Harley, who becomes wise to the ongoing affair but must conceal it from the rest of the Adler clan. His role in the film is small, but it'd be a scene-stealing supporting role if it weren't for the presence of Alec Baldwin.

That's the good news. The bad news is that It's Complicated is just a teensy bit too long and a teensy bit more uncertain about what it wants to say about adultery. With one leg of the comedy tripod dropping the ball (I'm looking at you, Steve Martin), there are parts of the movie that just aren't funny; for example, a dance scene featuring Martin goes on a bit too long and seems designed simply to evoke an earlier time when Martin's antics were funny. Here, though, it just comes across as tired. As for the issue of adultery, this is (appropriately enough) complicated. For most of the movie, the affair is treated lightheartedly; our protagonists are likeable people, and they like each other, so despite Jane's reservations there's not much to worry about. Moreover, we're trained to dislike Jake's new wife Agness (Lake Bell) because she's fickle and shrewish with a child from a previous relationship, yet a few scenes near the end of the movie align us a little more closely with Agness than perhaps is comfortable. Of course, I'd likely be griping if the film had made Agness a cardboard baddie, but I guess what I was looking for was something a little less complicated than what I got.

For the most part, though, It's Complicated is an uncomplicated romp with some fine performances captaining a pretty funny ship.
Rated R "for some drug content and sexuality," It's Complicated contains a few scenes of pot smoking and, of course, people having an affair.

Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)

Forgive me for having never seen a Wes Anderson movie before Fantastic Mr. Fox, but I think I get the gist. I appreciate Fantastic Mr. Fox for what it is, but I think I get a sense of how fast some of Anderson's themes would get old. As it stands, Fantastic Mr. Fox is a "small doses" film and does a fine job as such.

I love Roald Dahl, almost as much as I love Batman, so I needed to see this movie - especially considering that Matilda is one of my all-time favorite book-to-movie projects. I'm also a big fan of George Clooney, who voices the aforementioned Mr. Fox, an animal version of Danny Ocean off on the biggest heist of his life - robbing local farmers Boggis, Bunce, and Bean (the latter of which is voiced by Michael Gambon) against the wishes of his reform-minded wife Felicity (Meryl Streep).

I had a little difficulty with the voice cast in this film, mostly because they're SO recognizable; Clooney and Streep have unmatchable (and, if a YouTube search is any proof, inimitable) voices, so it becomes problematic for me to see their voices coming from things that don't resemble them. Similarly, when I listen to Bill Murray, I don't instantly think "badger," but apparently Wes Anderson did. Fortunately this jarring effect is only temporary, and by the end of the film it all feels better.

I like what Anderson & Co. did in terms of expanding the story from Dahl's original book. Here, Anderson's version really imbues each character with an arc and a sense of purpose, and it does so without the audience feeling strongarmed into sympathizing with these creatures. Particularly the Foxes' son Ash (Jason Schwartzman) has a compelling storyline in which he struggles to fit in amid the competition provided by his cousin Kristofferson (Eric Chase Anderson). It's the kind of storyline that could have felt forced or even overplayed, but Fantastic Mr. Fox pulls it off smoothly.

A lot of the film's success is due to its runtime - slightly more than 80 minutes. Short and sweet, Fantastic Mr. Fox doesn't have time to run out of steam. Instead, the focus is on the plot and on the characterization. However, I'm not eager to see more of Anderson's films after this one; themes of alienation, problematic family dynamics, and individuality seem like they'd be overplayed if given more than 80 minutes of consideration. So while I'm happy with Fantastic Mr. Fox - indeed, surprisingly so, since I hadn't expected to enjoy it - I think I'll take Wes Anderson in small doses.
Courtesy of the MPAA, Fantastic Mr. Fox is rated PG "for action, smoking, and slang humor." All of that is just silly business. They do, however, substitute the word "cuss" for almost every swear word imaginable in this film, so think about that when you give the DVD to the kiddies.