Drive

First Hit:  A perfect role for Ryan Gosling and a very good film.

When an actor fits the role and it's within their wheelhouse, then add an interesting story, it is a pleasure to drop into the story and let it go.

Drive does this because the film is perfect for Gosling who plays the “Driver”. There are times when a character needs to have a historic storyline to make his character believable. However great acting, as delivered in this particular role, doesn't require this type of development to make the character and film work. In Drive we have the later. 

Driver is a mechanic at a small garage run by Shannon (played by Bryan Cranston). Driver also works as a Hollywood film stunt driver, and does odd driving jobs for robberies. He runs into a neighbor woman named Irene (played by Carey Mulligan) who has a young son. He is immediately attracted to Irene and her boy. The chemistry between them is obvious. There are lots of moments of silence between them, but they say so much.

Irene is married to a Standard (played by Oscar Isaac) who is in prison and when he gets out he owes money to the mob that protected him while he was in prison. For payback, the mob asks him to do a job and he solicits Driver to help him.

The job goes bad and the local mob is now after the money that Driver is holding. Driver wants to give the money back to protect Irene but Bernie (played by Albert Brooks) and Nino (played by Ron Perlman) want everyone eliminated that know about this blown job.

Gosling is perfect as the quiet, private, intelligent and remotely caring Driver. This is a grand performance because he says so very little but provides so much information. Mulligan in a role that matches her age is wonderful. Her ability to play off of the quiet Driver is amazing. Cranston is very good as they guy beholding to too many people and continues to have “bad luck”. Isaac has the right look and feel of the guy scared and tough at the same time. Brooks is the surprise here. He’s great as the local mob ringleader with a dark heart. The defining moment is when he kills Shannon in a caring, subtle, and decisive way. Perlman is just right for this off-handed second in command guy who at “59” continues to screw things up. Hossein Amini wrote a very good screen play including when to have silence in a character’s role. Nicolas Winding Refn directed this with a great feel for LA and the type of characters which reside there.

Overall: I fully enjoyed this film but I would have like just a little more driving.

Contagion

First Hit: Interesting, scary, overcomplicated stories and created questions of realism.

What would happen if a new disease came to this world that had a high R 0 factor (R Naught). Although it was explained as a primary part of the film, it wasn’t reinforced enough throughout the film for me to understand the some of the dialogue they used later.

From what I understood a high R Naught means that for every one person who dies multiple more will die. Anyway this was just one of the confusing things in this film. Then I kept having questions while the celluloid rolled. If they created a contagious area, sealed it off a whole city, who would man the electric power stations? Who controls all the other social utilities if the city (Chicago) is dying from a disease?

And although the film-makers showed a society degenerating by having people breaking into banks, grocery stores, and pharmacies; I kept wondering who’s running the electrical grid. Anyway, outside of the problems in this film because it compromised the way society would breakdown with this disease, it did bring up great questions about what would happen if a devastating disease struck the world.

Beth (played by Gwyneth Paltrow) is ground zero for this disease (we discover this at the end of the film). She stops on her way home and has a quickie with an ex-boyfriend (why was this important?), comes home to her husband Mitch (played by Matt Damon), who ends up being immune to the disease but her son isn’t and both the son and wife die.

The film includes the involvement of the WHO and a bunch of other agencies which lets us know that this is important and out of control. The way the WHO and the US Government methodically find a cure and plan how to immunize a lot of people was interesting, but overall this film tried to make drama in too many places which dissipated the energy of the film. I would have rather stayed with just a few of the people and not try to give us so much about so many.

One of the opening scenes when they cut Beth’s scull open to analyze her death, I found myself cringing but ready for a film that would be more focused, it fell off the table and became a different film from there.

Paltrow has a small but critical part because she is ground zero. Damon was good as the caring father. Marion Cotillard as Dr. Orantes was very good and probably did the best acting in this film. Jude Law was very good at playing a blogger named Alan Krumwiede as someone who was skeptical of the government’s action on the disease but he was worse in his lying to his public. Laurence Fishburne was OK as Dr. Cheever and I really thought the story was overplayed when he gave his wife a heads up to leave Chicago. There were lots of other actors but this film didn’t require it and in fact dissipated its energy. Scott Z. Burns wrote the script and made it too complicated by adding lots of strong parts. Steven Soderbergh directed this film and, to me, it needed simplification in some areas to create a more powerful effect.

Overall: This was a good film but too many stories with big time actors dissipated the strength of the idea.

Circumstance

First Hit:  A very strong film representing both the oppression of women in the Middle-East and the taboo of non-traditional sexual orientation.

Atafeh (played by Nikohl Boosheri) comes from a wealthy and connected family. Her brother Mehran (played by Reza Sixo Safai) has had drug problems and comes back home to work on creating a clean life for himself.

As part of his transformation he finds himself in mosques praying as a way to keep his sober life. Atafeh’s friend in school is Shireen (played by Sarah Kazemy)  who comes from a less wealthy family and is a beautiful quiet girl. Together they do things they aren’t supposed to do; they go to parties with men, wear sexy clothing, drink alcohol and end up in jail for some of their indiscretions.

The scenes showing the youth having fun, dancing and then being raided by the morality police were interesting and provocative. As I’ve not lived in a country that does this, I can only imagine what it is like.

Added to this is that Shireen and Atafeh love each other and are intimate. This is frowned upon in their society so Shireen marries Mehran to be near Atafeh, but jealousy and control develop on the siblings parts and this creates additional family struggle.

From a film perspective I applaud the film for sharing the views and lives of a different country, but the film’s quality and its presentation waiver throughout its 107 minutes. I did like the music because it combined traditional and hip-hop Iranian sounds.

Boosheri was really strong and excellent in her role as a young confused woman stretching the bounds of her life as set forth by society. Kazemy was immensely beautiful in a quiet way and did a great job of holding in her confusion and difficulties of being poor, gay and a woman trapped in a restrictive society. Safai was strong in showing the shift of being lost to finding solace in prayer. As he conformed to the rules of his society, he becomes clearer in his life. Maryam Keshavarz wrote and directed this film and it is clearly from a woman’s perspective.

Overall: This was a very good film and I appreciated the push to show the audience the difficulty of life in Iran.

Love Crime (Crime d'amour)

First Hit:  Occasionally brilliant, other times confusing and in the end adequately done.

Powerful business women, deceit, and the climb to the top were the subjects of this film.

Christine (played by Kristin Scott Thomas) is a senior executive in Paris looking for a way to move up the corporate ladder and into New York, the home offices of the company she works for. Her beautiful smart assistant Isabelle (played by Ludivine Sagnier) works long and hard to make her boss look great.

Isabelle also loves Christine and at times you think the reverse is true as well. They both sleep with men but are not married. When Christine takes credit for Isabelle’s work, Isabelle is hurt and as their relationship becomes strained, it becomes an office war.

Although the story and intent feels clear, the script, direction and acting, especially on Thomas’ part, is uneven. At times intense and other times her acting came with a lack of energy.

The script called for American business men coming to meet with them, but quite frankly, the meetings had no substance and everything seemed miscast in those moments. Isabelle sets the mood for the last half of the film as she becomes vengeful.

There is a reference to some past unstableness, but it isn’t explored and this makes her devious plan to get back at Christine questionable.

Thomas is not at her best in this role. I liked the hardness of her character, but felt the part meandered. Sagnier carried a lot of energy in her role with expressions and a wavering mental stability, but where did this come from? There was little mining and character development but this wasn’t her fault. This was the issue of the writers Alain Corneau and Nathalie Carter who created a script which had holes in it. What business were they in? What were the skills required? I wanted some depth to the business and the characters. Alain Corneau directed this and he needed to create a film with more depth. It seemed more aimed and the con.

Overall:  Not much of a film when it is seen from its whole.

Higher Ground

First Hit: An uneven film but it does open dialogue around people’s belief in God.

This is Vera Farmiga’s directorial film debut and she selected to do a film about religion and one’s belief in God.

It begins with Corinne (played by Taissa Farmiga as young Corinne and Vera Farmiga as adult Corinne) watching her parents struggle, especially when her younger brother dies. Her father begins to drink and the family splits up. Corinne is a quite introverted girl and meets Ethan (played by Joshua Leonard), the lead singer of a rock and roll band. The become very close, she gets pregnant, and they get married.

While traveling to a gig in the van with other band members they crash off the road and end up in a river. Ethan makes sure Corinne gets to the shore but she is hysterical because the baby is still in the van. Ethan goes back finds the baby alive and OK and from then on he believes that God saved him and the baby. Corinne is less convinced but tries to become more religious and to become a full believer.

The film sets this up so that we can watch the main characters and others in the film deal with their belief in God. However, here is where the film meanders and loses focus from time to time. I never did fully believe that Corinne believed in God and I’m not sure that this was on purpose or not.

The other thing I didn’t believe is that Pastor Bud (played by Bill Irwin) was a believer himself. It was almost that he preached so that he could believe which could have been the point as well. If this was the case, the film really fails to setup these questions.

Taissa Farmiga was really good as a young thoughtful girl attempting understand life and religion. Vera Farmiga was good at times and appeared lost at times which meant it was an uneven performance. Leonard was OK but like Farmiga it felt uneven. Irwin was stronger than other actors as a pastor who likes to control his flock through platitudes. Carolyn S. Briggs and Tim Metcalfe wrote this script which seemed unclear at times and pointed at others. Vera Farmiga did a good job of directing others, not so good with herself and the overall story needed tightening up and the film made more crisp.

Overall: The subject was interesting but leaving the theater I didn’t think the film gave me enough to think about or consider the next day.