Brooklyn's Finest

First Hit: A very well acted film that doesn’t spin a Hollywood ending but lacks character development.

The main actors, Don Cheadle, Ethan Hawke, Richard Gere, Wesley Snipes, and Ellen Barkin are all strong characters in this film.

This is a three story film focused around Gere, Cheadle and Hawke. Gere plays Eddie a cop who has just a week to go until he retires. He’s an alcoholic, divorced, lonely, doesn’t want to live nor does he care much about his fellow officers.

Cheadle is an undercover cop named Tango who is embedded into the Brooklyn drug scene. He did time in the same prison as Caz (Snipes) to build a trusting friendship and now works at the highest level of Caz’s drug business.

He's also being pressured by Agent Smith (Barkin). Hawke plays Sal a plain clothes drug cop who has 4 kids with twins on the way. His wife is ill from the mold in their cramped house and so he’s under self imposed pressure to get a hold of some cash to buy a new home.

Barkin plays Agent Smith a very hard nose woman demanding that Caz take a huge risk for her. Snipes plays Caz, a Brooklyn drug lord just out of prison and back in the neighborhood. He finds the drug trade risky and wonders about how to get out of the business with his paper (money). The three stories are; Eddie retiring alive, Hawke finding a way to divert drug money into his pocket for a new home, and Cheadle doing what he needs to do so that he can get a promotion, have a desk job and get his life back to something he understands.

The way the film begins there is a lot of suspense and identification of each person in their present situations, but what was missing was how each person got to their particular state of mind.

The film’s ending brings all three unrelated stories to a close in one location.

Cheadle was by far and away the most powerful force in the film. He was riveting. Snipes was very strong and I was happy to see him in a role where he wasn’t some super warrior. Gere was rather low key but effective as a cop who was just done with being a cop and was counting down the days. Hawke was good, but his character seemed a bit more scattered than made sense. Barkin, in what amounted to a two scene role, was very strong.

Overall: The film was entertaining. Because it bounced between three stories there never was an out breath to take it all in. I would have like less intense action and a little more character development, like how did Gere become so jaded?

The Yellow Handkerchief

 First Hit: A slow paced indie film that has a nice story to tell.

William Hurt is well cast as Brett Hanson, a loner who comes out of prison hoping to connect with his one and only true love May (played by Maria Bello).

Others who are leaving prison at the same time are met by loved ones while Hurt simply looks down a long empty road. Hanson walks into a small town, orders a beer and observes Martine (played by Kristen Stewart) having a disagreement with a young man. It is obvious that the young man took advantage of Martine and doesn’t want anything else to do with her.

He also watches Gordy (played magnificently by Eddie Redmayne), who appears to be a bit odd and goofy, ask a store owner for a disposable camera that has expired film. Martine sees something in Hanson that makes her curious about him. Each of begins to leave the cafe at the same time and they all end up together in Gordy's car heading "south." 

None of these people know each other but they are alike in that they are loners, lonely and are viewed as outsiders by others. This connection makes for a slightly uneasy ride in Gordy’s car towards New Orleans. On their trip, the stories of these three start to unfold with Hanson’s being the primary story. They learn how he ended up in prison and about his love for May.

His story is created in flashbacks with him and May learning how to embrace their love for each other. Hurt is perfect as the quiet lonely drifter who “has never made an important decision” in his life.

Bellow is sublime as May; a woman who’s made numerous important bad decisions and whom Hanson says, her "whole life" is in her face. Redmayne is wonderful as Gordy a very quirky, out of the box, kind of guy who follows his own path. Stewart is OK playing, yet another, sort of dark intense young girl who is barely finding her way. Udayan Prasad shoots this film with long slow moving scenes which, at times, takes life out of the film. However, it is clearly sensitive and can bring an emotional response.

Overall: I enjoyed the film; especially seeing Hurt and Bellow in their roles. They both brought strong characters which complemented their respective parts and created an engaging story.

North Face (Norwand)

First Hit: What a powerful dramatization of an attempt to climb the North Face of the Eiger mountain in the Alps.

Philipp Stolzl co-wrote and directed this fascinating drama about “the problem we have in the alps.”

The “problem” is that, by 1936, no one had successfully climbed the North Face of the Eiger and the Germans felt that they should be able to conquer anything.

This recreation was extremely well done. Benno Furmann plays Toni Kurz and Florin Lukas plays Andreas Hinterstoisser as two lifelong friends who love mountain climbing together. A best friend of theirs Luise (played by Johanna Wokalek) has followed their climbing career and, as the film begins, is a news reporter excited to record her childhood friends' attempt to climb the North Face.

There are numerous other teams ready to climb as well, but the inclement weather discourages all others except another team from Austria. As the two teams climb up the face, mistakes of judgment are made, the weather turns bad and it becomes an extreme test of survival.

Furmann was great as the conservative climber as was Lukas as the chancy edgy climber. Together you see their complementary character strengths. Wokalek is wonderful as their lifelong friend who is also in love with Furmann’s character. The direction of this film was extraordinary in creating a sense of the drama on the mountain. His ability to make the audience feel as if they were part of the climb was amazing. More than a few times I found myself cringing in pain while reaching out wanting to help the climbers to safety.

Overall: This isn’t a standard Hollywood feel good film; it is a powerful drama sharing a story of life and death.

Dear John

 First Hit: This film was designed to bring tears and evoke emotion which it does.

This was an obvious film from the beginning and stayed obvious to the end. I mean with a title like "Dear John" and the main character is in the Army, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out one of the story lines. It doesn’t necessarily mean it was a poor film; it is just means that the audience knows what's coming. And, frankly I enjoyed it.

Savannah’s (played by Amanda Seyfried) purse falls off the edge of pier, and John (played by Channing Tatum) was standing nearby and he jumps off the pier and recovers the purse. There is an instant attraction and so they start seeing each other.

They have two weeks of dating because they are both just visiting the area. During this time, as you suspect, their love for each other grows. However, she has to go back to school and he has to return to his Special Forces unit and head off to unknown places.

They stay connected by writing each other long letters. He promises to be back and out of the Army in a year, but then September 11th happens and he decides to stay in the Army, for the good of the cause, instead of coming home to her.

Seyfried, is attractive, interesting and holds up her end of the film. Tatum is charming, smoldering and attractive enough to ensure the chemistry between these two worked. Richard Jenkins plays Tatum’s father who is a bit autistic and obsessed with coins. And as Jenkins generally is, he is perfect and wonderful in this role.

Overall: This is a safe predictable film and enjoyable enough to sit back and let yourself be bitten by it's emotional predictability.

44 Inch Chest

First Hit: It started off well but faded as the film moved along then ended with a thud.

This strong cast of Ray Winstone (playing Colin Diamond), John Hurt (playing old man peanut), Tom Wilkinson (playing Archie), Ian McShane (playing Meredith), Stephen Dillane (playing Mal), and Dave Legeno (playing Brighton Billy), are close friends gathering together to support one of their own.

Colin has come home to his wife Liz (played by Joanne Whalley) who proceeds to tell him that she has met another man and doesn’t love him any longer. He pleads with her to understand how could this be the case after 21 years and that she is everything to him.

She doesn't relent and in his anger he tries to strangle her. To escape she runs through a sliding glass door window. He contacts Archie, who contacts the others in the group who gather together to help him. This assistance consists of the group kidnapping this man from his job as a waiter in a restaurant and depositing him in a wardrobe cabinet in a deserted building.

Gathered together, they sit Colin in front of the wardrobe expecting him to take his revenge out on this young man. Most of the film centers around how they encourage him with their rants and their own sick ways of viewing the situation. Each person has a different focus, but they are in agreement that Colin must extract his revenge.

However, Colin doesn't know what to do he is so hurt. As brisk as the dialog is at the beginning, it loses steam and the film eventually falls flat.

Winstone has been better (See him in Edge of Darkness). Hurt is ranting and shows little else in and of his character. Wilkinson is the only one who seems to have some character development that is meaningful. The writers, Louis Mellis and David Scinto, had an interesting idea but seem to have gotten lost in creating intense and intense dialogue which kept the film from moving along.

Overall: Where "Glengarry Glen Ross", was filled with intense and competitive dialogue which moved the film along, this film is filled with intense dialogue and which makes the film fizzle out.