Snowpiercer

First Hit:  Odd story, interesting scenes, and generally unsatisfying.

Global warming has us (humans) attempting to fix the problem with a pill (sort of speak). We spray stuff into the atmosphere to cool down the planet and we send ourselves into a deep freeze. All but a few hundred people remain, alive, on a perpetual motion train on an endless loop. Odd story – yes.

The train is divided into different sections, by classes, whereas the first class people get real food, alcohol, and have a good life as this train drives around this year long circle. However, the people in the back of the train get blocks of protein to eat, live in squalor and lose their limbs with infractions against the other classes. Wilford (Ed Harris), who is the person in charge of the train, believes that everyone has their place and their duty/job. Cutis (Chris Evans), who lives in the rear of the train wants to get control of the train and create a more equal environment among its passengers.

The film is about a social revolution. Some of the scenes where Mason, (Tilda Swinton) Wilford’s speaker and emissary, speaks to the trains’ passengers are priceless. 

Although many of the characters are interestingly unique like, Namgoong (Kang-ho Song), Tanya (Octavia Spencer) Yona (Ah-sung Ko), and Gilliam (John Hurt) and a number of the battle scenes to overtake the train are of interest, it was generally unsatisfying story and execution of the story.

Harris does a good job of being arrogantly omnipotent yet there was a lack of depth in his performance that took away from the film. Evans did a very good job of carrying his character through this odd story and making it work. Swinton was unique, flamboyant and engaging when on the screen. Song was enigmatically interesting in his role as the one who thinks he knows what is going on outside the train. Spencer was wonderful as the mother and lover of the movement to change the status quo. Ko was incredibly engaging in her role. Hurt was excellent as the knowing old man who was once the partner of Wilford’s. Joon-ho Bong and Kelly Masterson wrote this imaginative and unfathomable story. Bong also directed the film.

Overall:  Although it was an interesting film, I left the theater not thinking much about the experience of watching it.

Jersey Boys

Hit:  Music was memorable and most everything else wasn’t.

Jersey Boys is the story of the “Four Seasons” a group that started in the 1950's and lasted through much of the 1960's before they imploded.

This film is supposed to provide the biographical history of this Jersey based group while providing entertainment. On the musical entertainment end – I really enjoyed the film as anyone, who was around they threw out hit after hit, would have.

The worst parts of the film were incorrect historical references: The first reference to Topo Gigio as an act on the Ed Sullivan show was many years too early. There are also wording references that were not used until the 1980's or 1990's. One segment that felt a bit creepy to me was his singing “My Eyes Adored You” to his daughter. Knowing the song, these two lines alone make it a bit weird: “though I never laid a hand on you…” “playin’ make-believe you're married to me….”

Another aspect that didn’t work was that I never got the sense that they loved the music. I know they must have, but there was nothing in the film that provided that depth of character. What drove them to create the group, as an alternative to being thugs?  

Because this is what the film suggests, I wondered where the story was that had me "get" this. To be in the music business and go through all the ups and downs, you've really got to love music. Yes, they made a great and unique sound for that era - but why did they want to be musicians?

Other parts that were missing had to do with how did Valli's home life fall apart? We didn’t really see the failings of the marriage but were told what they were. In film “show don’t tell” are by words.

Piazza played Tommy DeVito who was the ringleader of the group and of the illegal activities. Piazza did a great job of being arrogant, ignorant, slimy and controlling. Although I didn’t like the character – I wasn’t meant to. John Lloyd Young played Frankie Valli. Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice wrote a week script because it skated around the deeper aspects of the people and story. Clint Eastwood did a poor job of taking this story and making it watch worthy. I did think he did a great job of presenting the music and it appears that was the only thing he was interested in.

You will have to be old enough or fond of old music to sit through this film.

Dom Hemingway

Hit:  This is a well done story about a man who is not likeable and continually makes bad choices.

Dom (Jude Law) is full of himself. He’s been an angry criminal his whole life.

As the film begins he’s in jail and telling the audience, over and over again, why his “cock” is a work of art. You don’t see the person giving him a BJ but you know he’s getting one.

That is the opening scene. He’s Dom Hemingway and the audience and the other character’s in the film know this. He gets released from jail after serving 12 years for not ratting out Mr. Fontaine (Demian Bichir).

His first act is to find the guy who supported his wife while he was in prison and beat the holy livin’ crap out of him. He’s not seen his daughter in all this time and wants to see her and maybe develop a relationship. But he is afraid of reaching out because he knows he's done wrong by her. To deal with it, he drinks himself into his next mistake.

This film is dark, Dom is dark and makes a slew of bad choices thinking he’s invincible. Did the film work? Yes. Was the subject likeable? Not to very many people. And that is the hard part of this film. It is really difficult to like Dom. However he does have a friend in the film Dickie Black (Richard E. Grant) and it is this friend that eases the film through Dom’s tirades.

Law is fully engaged with the character Dom and played him well. It is just difficult to like the character. Birchir is very good as the mob chief who owes Dom money for his silence. Grant is superb as Dom’s grounding friend. Richard Shepard both wrote and directed this film. The writing and direction was good, it is simply a dark film with an unlikeable character.

Overall:  Not very likeable.

Draft Day

First Hit:  Overall, it was enjoyable, partially predictable and at times surprisingly unpredictable.

The world of drafting sports players onto professional teams has become big business. Television rights, high-level news reporting and “fantasy leagues” all contribute to the business side of televising this event. Although I’m aware of the draft days (mostly for football and basketball), I do not care enough to watch these events because it just isn’t that important or interesting to me.

What interested me about this film was hoping to see how deals were made before the choices are announced on television. I also thought that Kevin Costner, playing Cleveland Brown’s General Manager Sonny Weaver Jr., would be good at playing this sort of character. He did and so did Dennis Leary as Coach Penn. They both played great antagonist, power control issue roles. 

The story begins with 24 hours on the clock before teams, in their draft order, have 10 minutes name the player they want to sign to their teams. There is always heavy competition by the players to be picked high up in the draft because that guarantees’ them more money. Weaver begins the final day receiving phone calls from players who want him to draft them and also from the team’s owner Anthony Molina (Frank Langella) who wants his GM to “make a splash”.

The pressure is building because Coach Penn wants specific people drafted. Then the calls from other GM’s wanting to trade people and draft choices begin to come in. To add a more human aspect of Weaver’s life, he has a relationship with Ali (Jennifer Garner) the team’s financial guru. She had told Weaver the night before that she is pregnant with his baby and supposedly their relationship is hidden from the staff. But it is the final moments of when the league commissioner begins to announce the choices and how the dealing of people quickens.

Costner is smooth, intelligent and believable in this role. He was very strong as the general manager. Leary was perfect as the strong ego centric coach that wants to prove himself with the right players. Langella was sublime as the team’s owner – he carried this role perfectly. Garner is plenty smart and good in this role and I guess there was more of her character in the film. Griffin Newman as Rick the intern was specifically fun to watch and he did the intern role very well. Scott Rothman and Rajiv Joseph wrote a credible screen play. Ivan Reitman directed this with a good view of the way a draft day could play out.

Overall:  I people knowledgeable of the draft process would appreciate the way it is done here because it is educational. 

Noah

First Hit:  Initially bored, story interpretation unbelievable, and a few minor amazing scenes.

I enjoy watching biblical stories and a director’s interpretation of this book. I was put off by the beginning of the film with the screen captions stating the story of the beginning. Then we were led into an interpretation of the biblical story of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, then the story of Seth.

Then we are introduced to angels that ended up as moving rocks which are their prisons for assisting human kind. Director Darren Aronofsky shows the earth as mostly barren because of Cain’s clan mining of glowing rocks. First, I don’t believe for a minute that the Earth would be that barren in that time period by clans of people mining rocks.

There was a hint of technology by showing the audience some of the deserted mines, yet there was a primitiveness to everyone that seemed incongruent. Another item that didn’t work for me was the different accents of the actors. We had Australian/New Zealand (Russell Crowe as Noah), English/Wales (Anthony Hopkins as Methuselah), American (Jennifer Connelly as Naameh – Noah’s wife), English (Emma Watson as Ila), and it goes on.

There was no attempt to change this by the Director or Actors. Some of the highlights were some of the shots. One in particular that took my breath away was a shot of dusk, Noah and Naameh were silhouetted on a slight round hill against the sky – truly one of the most beautiful shots I’ve ever seen on film. I was also very impressed with the scene where Noah tells the story of life on earth because they used evolution and biblical terms and mixed them very well. It was simple and perfect.

I thoroughly enjoyed the full engagement Watson gave in her performance – it was stellar. Crowe also gave his all to his performance and I believed that he believed he was doing “the creator’s word”.

Crowe, as I previously stated was very good. He emanated the strength of the role and story. Connelly seemed like a fish out of water – almost too sophisticated for the part. Hopkins was cute more than anything. I got that he probably enjoyed being a Yoda of sorts. Watson was sublime. Her innocence, beauty, and wisdom were all present and forthcoming in this role. Aronofsky and Ari Handel wrote an uneven script and at times implausible. Aronofsky’s direction followed the unevenness and implausibility of his own script.

Overall:  I was severely disappointed by this film.