The Rhythm Section

First Hit: This is Blake Lively’s (as Stephanie Patrick) movie from beginning to end.

Blake Lively can act, and here we see how good she can be.

The story opens by letting us know that Patrick is a lost soul. She is slowly destroying herself by using heroin and supporting this habit through prostitution. We learn that Stephanie has turned to this life of self-destruction because she lost her entire family in a suspicious plane crash three years earlier. She was supposed to be on that plane.

A reporter named Keith Proctor (Raza Jaffrey) comes to the brothel and buys time with Stephanie so that he can speak with her about what he’s working on. Proctor is investigating who are the people who planted the bomb on the plane that killed her parents. Patrick, unsure of Procter’s real intention, dashes out of the room and gets the house bouncer to physically throw Proctor out. She doesn’t want to be reminded of her pain.

However, Proctor left his business card, and as Patrick gets ready to hit up with another dose of smack, she decides to bolt out of the brothel ending up at Proctor’s London apartment. The verbal sparring here is wonderfully done because Proctor holds his ground of just wanting to get more information and to give Patrick information about what really happened to the plane. Patrick, on the other hand, is utterly scared about having to face her own demons and re-live the emotional loss of her family.

Proctor has a room where there is a photo of each of the plane crash victims along with piles of folders containing information and evidence about what really happened on that plane. It includes information about who ordered the bombing, who made the bomb, and who set it off.

Getting the name of the person who built the bomb, Raza (Tawfeek Barhom), Patrick sets out to find him and get payback. But as she confronts Rasa face to face, in a moment of panic she cannot pull the trigger. However, because he’s now been discovered, Raza finds and takes it out on Proctor.

With Proctor no longer being able to help, Patrick uses one more bit of information from the files she took from Proctor’s apartment, a location on a map. Traveling to this location in a remote norther area of Scotland, she finds Iain Boyd “B” (Jude Law), a former MI6 agent.

She convinces B that she is going to kill the bomb maker and all the people associated with the bombing of the plane and asks him to train her. Skeptical of Stephanie’s abilities, B relents and teaches her how to shoot, fight, and keep fit while also giving her information on where she might find Raza and the unknown mastermind.

The thing that is most compelling in this story is how slowly we see Patrick’s incremental change from strung-out addict (pale, thin, haunting eyes, and bruised up) to someone who is not a fighting machine but a healthier person. We see her dive to right the wrong to her family and assuage her underlying guilt for not being on the plane with them.

Like an everyday person, Patrick never overwhelms anyone when she’s fighting, she’s authentically fighting for her life. She’s appropriately scared and clearly driven. And this is what makes this story engaging as Stephanie makes her way to find and resolve her family’s death.

All the scenes are well shot from the car chase scene to her training with B to the bus explosion. However, it is the time with Marc Serra (Sterling K. Brown), especially their last scene, where we see that Stephanie Patrick has learned what she needs to learn about herself and her abilities. She has freed herself from her past.

Lively is absolutely mesmerizing as this character. It is the grittiest role I’ve seen her in, and she nails it. Law is terrific as the elusive former MI6 Agent put to pasture. His direct approach to helping Patrick was excellent. Brown was engagingly cagey and incredible as the former CIA agent who sells information to bad people. Jaffrey was wonderful as the news reporter wanting to get to the truth. Mark Burnell wrote a powerful and pointedly direct script. Reed Morano got the best out of the actors while engagingly directing scenes keeping the audience fully engaged the entire time.

Overall: I really liked the way this story came together and the acting, all around, was superb.

A Simple Favor

First Hit: I enjoyed this quirky, twist filled, film.

Stephanie Smothers (Anna Kendrick) is a widowed mother of one young boy named Miles (Joshua Satine). His best friend at school is Nicky Nelson (Ian Ho) whose mother is Emily (Blake Lively) a high powered marketing person and his father is Sean Townsend (Henry Golding) a one novel writer.

Stephanie has a video blog which she dedicates, each filming to her deceased mother. Each vlog has useful household tips, cooking tips, or advice for dealing with the world. However, she’s got a secret.

One day she helps Emily out by watching her child and Emily doesn’t come back. This leads the film back a few weeks, into how Emily and Stephanie met, how they learned about each other, and how they became best friends. One of the secrets is that, although Emily and Sean work, they really cannot afford the house they are living in and they desperately need money.

This leads to a crazy plot that includes death, false identity, and Stephanie’s ability to sort-out and resolve pieces of the puzzle.

When it comes down to who knows what and who can better deliver the goods, Stephanie, Emily, and Sean have their own ways to settle the score.

The dialogue between Lively and Kendrick was funny, pointed and filled with sarcasm. There are plot holes, and things that don’t quite add-up, but from an entertainment value, this film was fun.

Kendrick was strong in this leading role. I believe this is the first film in which she was expected to carry the main work-load and she does it well. Lively was a hoot as this know-it-all, seen the world, been there done that kind of high powered marketing person. She clearly enjoyed the role. Golding was good as Blake’s hangdog husband. I never really got the connection that made it work for them, except that Lively’s character was so strong, he was under her spell. Jessica Sharzer wrote a pointed and rapid fire script which kept the movie moving along nicely. Paul Feig did a good job of keeping it both light and funny as well as dramatic with mystery.

Overall: I enjoyed the dynamics of the two women characters and how Kendrick used her analytical plodding way to uncover the truth.

Café Society

First Hit:  I was disappointed in this film.

The first thing was I couldn’t get over how quickly Bobby (Jesse Eisenberg) spoke his lines with rejoinders coming almost as fast in return.

It just didn’t seem like anyone (Director or Actors) wanted the let the words breathe and have some sense of feeling with them. It is reflective of a poor Woody Allen film. Eisenberg is no Allen (and I like Eisenberg's work) and speaking Allen’s words the way he was directed didn’t work.

Nobody does Allen like Allen (good or bad). With this overriding problem with the film, it seemed hard to get into the story. On a good note, I thought that Kristen Stewart (as Vonnie) was very strong. She was the only main character that seemed to feel her way into her character.

Steve Carell as Phil Stern was OK, but at times it just seemed as though he was straightjacketed as the big time movie producer. I never felt his attraction to either his wife or Vonnie, it all seemed for show. I did like the feel of the 1930’s set with the nightclub being especially embracing.

Eisenberg, either got poor direction or wasn’t right for the role in that his machine gun approach to the lines lacked depth and feeling. Stewart was the best character in the film and she continues to show why she is so much more than the “Twilight” girl. Carell was mediocre as the studio executive, and my sense it was the direction that failed him. Blake Lively was good as Bobby’s wife and the scene of their meeting was one of the better scenes in the film. Corey Stoll as the criminal element of Bobby’s family was also good. Woody Allen, narrated, wrote and directed this film and in all ways it seemed to lack heart and comedy.

Overall:  One film that is easily forgotten.

Savages

First Hit:  Overly done mishmash of drugs, violence and machismo.

Oliver Stone has done a wide assortment of films and many of them have stories based in violence.

This one is another of those violent films of his and it appears he wanted to say something about the word savages. What the point was of this movie didn’t land on me.

I found this film overly acted (by Benicio Del Toro and Salma Hayek to name too examples) while aiming to shock the audience with the type of the uncaring violence we see in the news coming out of Mexico.

My interpretation of the purpose of this film was to see what happens when two friends Ben and Chon (played by Aaron Johnson and Taylor Kitsch respectively), have their shared girlfriend O (played by Blake Lively) is taken from them because they didn't want to do a drug deal. The three of them love their life by making, selling and using their high grade pot.

Chon is an Iraqi war vet and is a cold killer but only has to use his skills occasionally to keep the drug payments flowing to their business. Ben is a botanist and is the creator of their product which exceeds all other pot in the world. He’s kind hearted and does volunteer work throughout the world when he’s not creating a new strain.

Elena (Hayek) is the leader of a Mexican drug cartel that wants Ben and Chon’s (names reminded me of Cheech and Chong – bad choice of names) product. Elena's enforcer is Lado (played by Del Toro). The film, which early on depicts beheadings and later on with lots of uncaring machismo violence, has no real point except we get to see Ben and Chon get their girl back after Elena kidnaps her to force a deal with the weed makers. For some acting relief, Stone has John Travolta as Dennis the dirty Federal Drug Agent.

Lively is pretty and, at times, plays an effective stupid girl who is a full blown pothead. Johnson is supposed to be the smart cool one and at times he’s OK in this role. Kitsch holds his role as non-caring enforcer well enough. Del Toro is overly slimy in his portrayal of an enforcer. Hayek is wasted in her role as an accidental drug cartel leader. Travolta made the most of his role and screen time. Shane Salerno, Don Winslow and Oliver Stone wrote this poorly constructed script with some stupid lines like “went all Henry the 8th on them”. Stone looks like he found a way to imbibe himself in drugs and violence once again.

Overall:  I enjoyed seeing my old playground town of Laguna Beach, but everything else was wasted – just like how the main characters spent most of their time.