Snowden

First Hit:  Oliver Stone is on his game – excellent film about a man who wanted to let us know that the US Government has been spying on us without our permission.

I won’t often get political in film reviews, however, nearly two years ago I saw a film called “Citizenfour” which was a Laura Poitras documentary film about Edward Snowden. I indicated then that I thought everyone needs to see how the US Government could use their existing technology to spy on anyone they wanted to.

This new Stone film uses the filming of the Poitras’ documentary as it’s center point plot device to fill in the picture in a fuller way. Stone tells the story leading up to Snowden (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt) making the choice to copy data files from the NSA’s database and share them with the media (Briton’s "The Guardian" newspaper was the first) from his hotel room in Hong Kong. This hotel room is where most of Citizenfour was shot and those events were effectively reproduced here by Stone.

Playing Poitras in Oliver's film was Melissa Leo, “The Guardian” correspondent, Ewen MacAskill, is played by Tom Wilkinson and Zachary Quinto played Snowden’s lawyer Glenn Greenwald. These were the people Snowden entrusted with the absconded data.

The film traces Edward’s path from a young man trying to get into the “Special Forces" because he wanted to do something for his country after 9/11. However, because of his weak and broken leg bones, he receives an Administrative Discharge from the Army. He then interviews with and joins the CIA. After joining the agency, he begins to date Lindsay Mills (Shailene Woodley) who teaches a creative dance, is a photographer and is very liberal.

This relationship is important to Snowden and it is a key to his seeing the everything more openly. The film has to tell a convincing story and, in my book, effectively does so. It provides enough information about how the data collection systems work. It gives you Snowden slowly realizing that what he’s doing, in his mind, is wrong. It gives you the struggle Edward and Lindsay have about his secret work, and how their love helped him make his decisions.

The sets of where Snowden worked were wonderfully constructed and gave the sense of the power behind computer data gathering. And although this film is 134 minutes long, I cannot think of where one scene could be cut to reduce the running time. Yes, this film is weighted towards Snowden’s view of the world and the rightness of the data he collected and distributed. And in my view it needs to push this view because the US Government is one hell of a spying machine and you do not know if you’ve been in their sites.

Gordon-Levitt was a perfect Snowden. And during the end and in the credits, where the real Snowden appears on the screen, you can see why Gordon-Levitt was selected. He not only looks like him, but he got Snowden’s speech pattern down as well. Leo, Wilkinson and Quinto were wonderful as the team supporting Snowden in the Hong Kong hotel room. Woodley was sublime. It was her that created the chemistry that made the relationship and much of the film work. I also appreciated Nicholas Cage as Hank Forrester an older, one-time coder, instructor to Snowden and one who fell out of grace with the CIA and was left to manage their cyber museum. Kieran Fitzgerald and Oliver Stone wrote an effective screenplay which wonderfully bounced from period to period without losing momentum. Stone did a fantastic job of bring this story to life in a way that made it interesting. Scenes were set up beautifully. I suggest that everyone see this film and Poitras’ film "Citizenfour".

Overall:  This was a fully engaging film about someone who has bucked our government and made them think (and blink).

Bridget Jones's Baby

First Hit:  Occasionally funny but generally slow and simply didn’t work.

The very first film of this series, Bridget Jones’s Diary, was fun and it worked in many ways. Being introduced to Bridget Jones (Renee Zellweger), a woman who struggles with her weight, is lonely and falls in love with two men. The second was somewhat more of the same; but by this film, the main thing we’ve dropped from the plot is the weight although there are references to weight in the film.

Another constant in the previous films are her two love interests Mark (Colin Firth) and Daniel (Hugh Grant). However, because Grant dropped out of project, he's referenced in a plot device funeral. Here Bridget is successful at her job as producer of a television program. She is celebrating her 43rd birthday and ends of doing it alone in her apartment. She goes to Daniel's funeral and runs into Mark.

A few days later, her coworker Jude (Shirley Henderson) decides to take Bridget to a rock-in-roll festival where she happens to fall into bed with Jack (Patrick Dempsey) and they have a sexual evening. Running into Mark again at a Christening, she has sex with him as well. Having sex with two different men in a short period of time (within a couple weeks of each other), she becomes pregnant and doesn’t know who the father is. That is the plot of this film.

Jones is pregnant, she’s going to keep the baby, she doesn’t know who the father is, and she may lose her job at work. Generally, this plot has a bit of interest but the execution is mediocre. At the end of the film a newspaper article comes up stating that Daniel is still alive, God I hope this doesn't mean there is another film planned.

Zellweger seemed out of place and unengaged in the part. Dempsey seemed to put the most energy into his part although there didn’t seem to be chemistry between him and Zellweger. Firth did well by keeping his stogy, disengaged self in tack. Henderson was delightful and carried her scenes well. Jim Broadbent as Bridget’s dad was his wonderful self and Gemma Jones as Bridget’s mum was good. Emma Thompson co-wrote and also played Bridget’s physician in a wry manner. The other co-writers were Dan Mazer and Helen Fielding. Overall the script was not very strong because it was more rehashed material, although the overall story idea could have been interesting. However, this film is too long and falls apart because of less than engaged acting and lapses of interesting direction by Sharon Maguire. For instance, the scenes of Mark and Jack carrying Jones to the hospital weren’t funny and could have been cut.

Overall:  Despite some funny moments, this film didn’t work and wasn’t worth the price of admission.

The Beatles: Eight Days a Week - The Touring Years

First Hit:  An amazing and touching look at four young men from Liverpool England that changed music and the lives of many people forever.

For anyone one growing up as a baby boomer you will have some memory of The Beatles. Maybe it was listening to the 45 rpm single records or the 33 1/3 rpm LPs. Maybe it was the news programs showing thousands of people screaming their names as they went from place to place. Maybe it was watching them on The Ed Sullivan show.

Over the years, those memories have been enhanced and guided by various films, books and stories about The Beatles since their breakup. I’ve read all the books, seen all the documentaries, read all the articles, but none of them affected me as much as this film.

I teared up early in the film as joy, wonder, and respect overcame me about these four young men who followed their dream, to make music, together. I cannot say enough for Ron Howard and his ability to put together strings of old interviews, concert footage clips, while adding present time interviews with both Paul and Ringo and a small select group of others who were part of their concert past.

I was touched when Paul talked about the moment when Ringo joined the group and that they all knew the final piece was in place. He also spoke about how happy he felt when he and John realized that they both wrote music as their most favorite thing to do. Ringo spoke about how the group held each other together when they were being overwhelmed by admirers. Then they spoke about how in the back of a Loomis armored truck being shuttled off the field at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, they decided together that they were done with playing live musical concerts.

As with all their decisions, they did things together. They supported each other regardless of what came up. For instance, the whole issue that came up about John saying, that at the time, with young people they were more popular than Jesus and the controversy this statement started. Or even, more importantly, when they refused to play a concert because there would be segregation of black and white audience members. In fact, they were the first band to have written in their contracts that their audiences cannot be segregated.  

I enjoyed Whoopie Goldberg’s interviews especially when she realized that The Beatles taught her that she could be anyone she wanted to be and feel good about it. The surprise her mother gave her when she said they were going to Shea Stadium and see The Beatles was priceless.

Elvis Costello, Sigourney Weaver, Larry Kane, and all the other interviewees were perfectly placed into the archival footage. This film was amazingly edited to create a strong story about the life The Beatles were having during the touring years.

Ron Howard did an incredible job of piecing together this footage to present a strong story about The Beatles and their touring years.

Overall:  Fantastic and made even better because seeing the film in theaters gives attendees a bonus, The Beatles performing their Shea Stadium concert. Pure joy watching these young men play together.

Author: The JT LeRoy Story

First Hit:  Recalling the 2005 public outcry that JT LeRoy wasn’t real, this film thoughtfully, engagingly and summarily tells the story behind the story of Laura Albert’s creation.

I recall reading stories about how the media thought they had been duped by Laura Albert to the existence of JT LeRoy (JT standing for Jeremiah Terminator). From first glance and reading the media’s views, it was understandable. Yet something was hauntingly strange about their indignant hurt.

One day, in 2013, I learned that Laura was a client at our SF Marina Bar Method Studio. When we spoke and I was quickly reminded about the hoopla that transpired in the press in 2005.

Although I learned a different story that day and in during subsequent conversations, it wasn’t until this film did I “get” the depth, complex and interesting portrait of her story. Laura was rightfully put off by the perception that she pulled off a “hoax” by asking her son's aunt Savannah Knoop, to be the public face of JT LeRoy.

While watching this film, we take a deep dive into the events of Laura’s life and her path into writing, thus furnishing Albert with a way to express the life being lived inside. The film, through the use of an unfathomable library of saved voicemails and telephone conversation recordings on mini and standard tape cassettes, we learn how Laura’s life unfolded and how creating stories allowed her a way to express herself through a difficult upbringing.

Although I think the film might have been stronger through some judicious editing, thereby reducing its running time, I found myself engaged and wanting Laura to be seen as someone who cares about living her life and the life of the characters she creates because they are part of her.

Jeff Feuerzeig wrote and directed this film. He did an effective job of moving back and forth through time to tell Laura’s story and how JT was created.

Overall:  It was a fascinating look into an author’s life, author Laura Albert.

Sully

First Hit:  An amazing, crisp, and well-acted film about a remarkable event showing how this pilot made an extraordinary set of decisions under extreme pressure.

I was profoundly affected by how much Tom Hanks (as U.S. Airways pilot Chesley ‘Sully’ Sullenberger) embodied the deeply rooted sense of responsibility for the 155 people on the plane he had to land in the Hudson River.

Like Sully, I was fully engrossed in wondering about everyone on the plane. The concern is demonstrated in so many ways:  1) Sully going up and down the aisle ensuring everyone is out of the plane. His last look towards the back of the plane before he exited was telling.  2) When he asked one of the officers of the pilot’s union to help him find out if everyone got off the plane.  3) the release of the subtle out-breath while being given a physical when he’s told, the survivor's count was 155.

We get multiple views of the event. We get a glimpse of what the air traffic controller went through, his heart being in the job. We get to see how the airline's insurance company and investigators aimed to have the water landing be pilot error. We see the closeness and distance Sully has with his wife Lorraine (Laura Linney).

We get to embrace the pilot and co-pilot (Aaron Eckhart as Jeff Skiles) relationship and how this event brought them closer together. Lastly, we the audience, see a public hearing about the event. All of this in a crisp well executed 96 minutes.

The dream sequences were powerful and were reminders of how a commercial airline plane can create enormous damage to a city. The film editing of the differing views of this event, was perfect. The conclusion, even though it is already public knowledge, is wonderfully suspenseful and gratifying.

Hanks is superb. He embodies the weight of the role of pilot and all the decisions Sully has made over the years. I would want all my pilots to be this man. Linney is good as Sully’s wife. While we never see them together, and her relationship with Sully during this film is solely by phone, it works, she’s able to bridge the gap. Eckhart is wonderful and strong as co-pilot Skiles. He was perfect. Todd Komarnicki wrote an very strong engaging script. Clint Eastwood’s direction was sublime. He captured so many aspects of the event and did this in a clear concise manner.

Overall:  This is a wonderfully executed film depicting a set of life saving decisions made clearly and with concise conviction.