Anomalisa

First Hit:  A dynamically interesting film with many layers of meaning the more I think about it.

Are the layers I see in this film of my development or was the intent of the film to have these layers or was the intent to just have us being thinking?

I don’t know and I’ll share a couple of the layers I’ve considered and neither of these are necessarily predominate in my thinking about the film. One layer is that Michael Stone (voice by David Thewlis) seems to become indifferent with any woman after he’s been intimate with them. He’s fascinated with them in the beginning and once physical intimacy happens, he begins to see and become critical of the person. I think that both men and women have had the experience of seeing someone different after sexual intimacy, I know I have.

Another layer is that Michael sees everyone as the same. This is juxtaposed with his character being the leader in how to deliver customer service by seeing each person as a unique individual. This juxtaposition is effectively created by having Tom Noonan be all the other character's voices (except Michael and Lisa’s).

Regardless, man or woman the voice is pretty much the same and while animated faces are also very close to looking like each other as well. Then from a "look" point of view, we have Michael with a strong unique look (is this how we see ourselves?), and everyone else is seen as having a more generic look. Lastly, with everyone in this film having their faces made of separate pieces/segments (no other body parts are drawn/animated this way) it is interesting that the only the faces are developed/drawn in this way.

This concept transitions to an interesting scene when Michael is hurrying down the hall of the hotel and the lower half of his face falls off. When it comes off, I wondered about everyone's faces being interchangeable. Anyway this is a fully animated film that is definitely of an adult orientation. The love making scene with Lisa (voice by Jennifer Jason Leigh) is very powerful and real.

This film is amazing in its presentation of the details of the body. Watching hair slightly move, the way Michael throws his hotel key down, the way the red lights as the door key doesn’t work – fascinating. The script for Lisa’s character was superb. Vulnerable and self-effacing, she becomes a voice of strength.

Thewlis carried Michael’s struggle well and was a great choice. Leigh was sublime as Lisa’ voice. It perfectly honest in its characterization. Tom Noonan created wonderful characterizations of the other voices. Charlie Kaufman wrote an amazing script. It captured human emotion and feelings extremely well. Duke Johnson joins Kaufman in directing this amazing story in an animated film.

Overall:  This is a complex film with many layers and levels and will leave you wondering for days afterward.

The Peanuts Movie - 3D

First Hit:  Uninspired and the saving grace is Snoopy and the scenes of his saving Fifi and fighting the Red Baron.

I’m not sure if it is my age or if this story is simply uninspired. Gaging by the young children around me in the theater, and the lack of excited engaged noise from them, I may not have been the only one who found this unimaginative.

The fun and amusing parts were Snoopy and his bird buddies because their scenes became the only laugh-out-loud segments. Yes the moral of Charlie Brown’s story was to speak up and talk to the Red Haired girl, but this story has been told before and lacked engagement.

Bryan Schulz wrote this script from Charles Schulz’ comic strips. Steve Martino directed this somewhat tired story which we know all too well.

Overall:  This felt like a upgraded retread of the same old story.

Inside Out

First Hit:  The film was conceptually brilliant, for the most part very well executed, and very intelligent.

There probably isn’t a human being on this planet who hasn’t experienced one or all of the following; fear, anger, sadness, disgust, and joy.

Given this, Pixar did what no other filmmaker has ever done well, create an interpretation of the inner workings of the mind and made them the film’s main characters. Riley (Voice by Kaitlyn Dias) and her family moved from Minnesota to San Francisco where she feels lost, without her friends, familiar surroundings, furniture, and her dad is stressing about a company he’s creating. The comfort of what once was is now gone and changing.

This change allows other feelings, besides joy, to have a larger voice in her head. What results is what happened in this 12 year old’s mind. This film is brilliant in the sharing how the other emotions of fear, anger, joy, disgust and most importantly sadness can creep into a young person’s life. The lesson of not covering up, but embracing them and working through them is well done and on point.

The only downside of the film for me is that joy spends too much time wandering around the inner recesses of the brain. This film could have cut out 10 minutes and been more effective. Lastly, because the film is only 94 minutes, Disney/Pixar felt compelled to run a short called Lava prior to this film. Lava was an extremely poor setup to Inside Out. Lava, as a lead-in was way too schmaltzy and sappy and hurt watching the beginning of Inside Out.

Amy Poehler as Joy was perfectly upbeat and single-minded. Phyllis Smith as Sadness was dead on perfect. Her ability to apologize and yet continue to create more sadness was amazing. Bill Hader as Fear was funny, his expressions we’re well thought through. Mindy Kaling as Disgust was good in this more minor role. Lewis Black as Anger was the funniest. The way he would be immediately triggered because of an event was perfect. Dias as Riley was very good, especially when she was introducing herself to her new classmates. Pete Docter and Ronaldo Del Carmen both wrote and directed this excellent animated film. The only downside was the amount of time spent wandering around long term memory.

Overall:  This was an excellent film and provided a way to know how the brain could work.

The OSCARS and Other Notes

It is that time of season again and although this year wasn't an especially great year for films, a couple of interesting and outstanding "out of the box films" caught my eye: "The Artist", The Tree of Life" and "Melancholia".

On the other side of the coin, I'm grateful that the Harry Potter series has ended as they became painful to watch. And the Sherlock Holmes film was also very bad.

Some performances I would have like to have been honored but weren't would include: Michael Fassbender in "Shame", Kirsten Dunst in "Melancholia", Charlize Theron in "Young Adult", Carey Mulligan  in "Shame" (cannot give enough credit for her singing "New York, New York" as though she was standing on the edge of a cliff ready to fall at any moment), Christoph Waltz in "Carnage", and Albert Brooks in "Drive". 

Given the selected honorees by the academy, here are my picks for some of the categories:

• Best Picture: "The Artist"

• Actor in a Leading Role: Jean Dujardin in "The Artist"

• Actor in a Supporting Role: Christopher Plummer in "The Beginners"

• Actress in a Leading Role: Michelle Williams in "My Week with Marilyn"

• Actress in a Supporting Role: Octavia Spencer in "The Help"

• Cinematography: "The Tree of Life" Emmanuel Lubezki

• Directing: Michel Hazanavicius for "The Artist"

• Film Editing: "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" Kirk Baxter and Angus Wall

• Adapted Screenplay: "The Descendants" Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon and Jim Rash

• Original Screenplay: "Margin Call" J.C. Chandor

To all of you: Thank you for coming to my site and reading my reviews. The number of views has grown tremendously over this past year. There are now over 550 reviewed films and it is fun for me to post and read your comments.

May this new year bring on better films with new ideas tested and old ones enhanced. I know I'll be there in the 5th or 6th row center ready to suspend belief into someone else's story.

May you

Be Well...

Michael

Tron: Legacy (3D)

First Hit: Great 3D visual experience and if the dialogue were better we’d have a good film.

The original film TRON wasn’t a great film, what made is irresistible was the cutting edge visuals. This second effort has many of the same; great visuals. The 3D adds so much to the original look and feel which makes this film fun to watch.

The film begins with Sam Flynn (played by Garrett Hedlund) playing havoc with the company he owns. The company is one his father Kevin Flynn (played by Jeff Bridges who also starred in the original) started with cutting edge technology before he disappeared into “the grid”. Kevin disappeared when Sam was only 2 and therefore Sam is angry at his father for leaving him.

Alan Bradley (played by Bruce Boxleitner) who was his father’s confidant tells Sam that his there was a page from Flynn’s old office below an arcade. Sam goes to the office and discovers a way to get sucked into the grid. There he meets his father’s alter ego Clu who challenges Sam (the User) to a match against his perfect programs. His programs are part of the perfection he was commanded to create by Kevin.

Sam with the help of Kevin's confidant Quorra (played by Olivia Wilde), escapes Clu's challenge on light-cycles and is delivered to his real father Kevin. Kevin on the other hand sees that perfection includes imperfection and that sometimes doing nothing is the best thing to do.

Philosophically this could have been an interesting film but what hurts this film is the dialogue. Kevin is reduced to living in the grid with no way back to reality after discovering the perfection.

The visuals are, again, extraordinary and just like the first film; I want to ride a light-cycle.

Bridges was good when the dialogue was OK but when it was poor, the film fell flat and Jeff looked less than the man who was master of the grid. Hedlund was good enough to make it work. Again, the script let the actors down. Wilde was very good and less affected by the poor script. Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz are to blame for much of the failings of this picture as their script was weak, unclear and not thought out. Joseph Kosinski exceeded my hopes on the visuals, I love them. However, the script needed a lot of work to hold up to the world created by the legacy of the first film.

Overall: Unfortunately the best part of this film is the visuals and the weak part is the dialogue. This is a very uneven film.