Downsizing

First Hit:  Slow, tedious, and, at times, funny and the only thing that made it worthwhile was Hong Chau as Ngoc Lan Tran.

Tran doesn’t appear until the last third of the film, but she changes the film and energetically makes the film interesting and better. Up until then the main character, Paul Safranek (Matt Damon), is generally depressed and lacks any energy.

Damon is too good an actor to phone it in, and therefore he must have been delivering what director and writer Alexander Payne wanted.

There is a point to the film and it’s about how humans are systematically destroying the planet. Norwegian scientist Dr. Jorgen Asbjornsen (Rolf Lassgard) wanting to find a way to slow down the destruction, comes up with making people smaller. In this case a normal 6’ person gets shrunk to about 5”. Asbjornsen figures it will allow humans to consume fewer resources and give us time to figure out how to save the planet.

The upside to downsizing, as it is called, is that your money is worth about one hundred times as much. This makes it worthwhile for people to downsize as they can afford to live a life of luxury. Paul and his wife Audrey (Kristen Wiig) are struggling financially and if they choose to downsize they can life a great life.

As Paul finds himself living a less than stellar life as a downsized person he has some regrets. When he meets, and spends a bit of time with his neighbor Dusan Mirkovic (Christoph Waltz) his life begins to change.

However, it really begins to change and the film begins to get interesting when Paul gets involved with helping Tran. Tran organized and led protests in Vietnam, survived prison time for her involvement, was downsized by the government, and escaped Vietnam inside flat screen shipping box. She became famous for this escape from Vietnam so Paul recognized her when he saw her.

Given her past, she works to help anyone who is struggling to survive in the downsized city they live in. Paul becomes inspired by her.

The visuals of the downsized world are excellent. The comedy comes from this and some of the interactions between the characters.

Damon was mediocre and I don’t know if this was a poor performance by him or by the script and direction. There were times I could sense and feel Damon trying to make the scene better but to no avail. Waltz was mediocre as well. He’s another reliable actor who can deliver and I’ve got to believe that script and direction failed him. Lassgard was OK as the discovering scientist and leader of the movement to downsize and survive. Wiig had a very small part in this film and her scenes seemed strained and pressed. Chau was priceless. It was worth the price of admission just to watch her perform in this film. She was spot-on sublime. Payne and Jim Taylor wrote the script which ended up being restrictive and pressed. Payne had no business directing this because the vision was too restrictive as the acting showed. He had great tools but it didn’t work.

Overall:  I had high hopes for this film and liked the characters, but it came up short, real short.

Rebels on Pointe

First Hit: A delightful and insightful film to the wonderfully joyful Les Ballet Trockadero de Monte Carlo dance company.

This film dives into this all male ballet dance company in a way that brings laughter, joy, sorrow and a deep human connection to the audience.

The dancers are an eclectic group from all over the world and their stories are similar: They didn’t fit well in their personal social situations and they love to dance. And dance they can. These men are extremely skillful dancers and by doing both the female and male roles of the ballets they dance, they bring an athleticism to the parts that are both different and wonderful.

To add to the engagement for themselves and the audiences, they augment their dances with a whimsical sassy comedic bent that is both physically and choreographically challenging.

This company has been together for more than forty years and it performs all over the world. Being gay, the dancers have struggled through the AIDS epidemic as well as enjoyed marriages between the dancers. This juxtaposition of how society has learned to embrace them is also visible by the number of children that come to see their performances. In the early years, parents did not bring their children because the gay dancers were not accepted by society, today lots of children come see them.

The film follows a few dancers more closely than others although my impression is that these dancers represented the group quite well. The current director use to dance with the company and his partner, also a dancer with the company, died from AIDS related causes. Additionally, the film follows them on tour to a few of the cities they regularly perform in and not surprisingly, they are a huge hit in Japan.

Bobbie Jo Hart wrote and directed this film with a lot of heart. The intimacy that is shared with the camera shows how well he embraced this subject.

Overall:  One of the most delightful and heart based films I’ve seen all year.

Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle

First Hit:  The interaction of the actors in this film make it work – I enjoyed it.

It is hard to miss the funny mark when you’ve got Jack Black (as Bethany), Kevin Hart (as Fridge) and Dwayne Johnson (as Spencer) together in a film. The wonderful part is that Karen Gillan (as Martha) held her own quite well with these three funny and larger than life guys.

A young Spencer (Alex Wolf) is nerdy and unsure of himself. As the film begins, he’s being taken advantage of by a young Fridge (Ser’Darius Blain), who is a big strapping young man. Intimidating Spencer into doing his homework Fridge creates a friendship of convenience.Although Spence is somewhat resentful of being taken advantage of he does it anyway. After they get caught cheating, they are sent to detention.

Young Bethany (Madison Iseman) is the class popular beauty. She’s constantly on her phone and uses her contrived sexuality to get her way in school.  She ignores a teacher’s request to put away her phone and gets sent to detention.

Young Martha (Morgan Turner) is a nerd and introverted. She hates PE and tells the teacher she won’t participate in the exercise class and gets detention.

This is the setup and together in detention they discover an old electronic version of Jumanji. Getting sucked into the game they end up in a jungle where they arrive as the opposite of who they are outside the game. Spencer (Johnson) is no longer an intimidated skinny nerd, he’s a big, strong assertive man. The big man on campus football player Fridge (Hart), has turned into a small wise cracking man. The beautiful Bethany (Black) turns into a short dumpy man. And the nerdy quiet Martha (Gillan) has turned into a beautiful, strong woman who is a martial arts expert.

Given this setup, a lot could go wrong if the situations and dialogue are weak or don’t allow the actors breathing room, however this is not the situation. It works: The situations and dialogue create scenes that are funny and allow the actors to interpret both their former younger selves while embodying their new older bodies and skills.

Johnson is fun to watch here because his ability to seem like his size and strength are new to him really works. His interactions with Hart are priceless. Hart does a great job of trying to make the others still believe he’s still the size of his younger self instead of his shorter self. The script makes good use of his innate talents of making wise cracks and barking out his intentions. Black is perfect. He makes you believe that he was once a beautiful young lady who is now trapped in a stubby man’s body. I enjoyed the scenes when he gave Martha lessons on how to seduce the men guarding the transportation building. Gillan was fantastic because, despite her beauty, she embodied the nerdy girl of her younger self. She was great as the martial arts expert, ready to kick some butt. Wolff, Blain, Iseman and Turner all did a wonderful job of being the younger characters. Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers did a nice job of creating a screenplay that enhanced the story and actors. Jake Kasdan elevated the story to something fun and engaging.

Overall: I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this film.

The Shape of Water

First Hit:  Beautifully crafted and acted, and I didn’t find it all that interesting.

Although most of the scenes are dark and have a green color tint, they are beautifully crafted. The greenish tint is in the walls of the lab, the color of the hallways in the facility, the color of the water in which the beast lives and the van that was used to transport the beast. To break up this hue, color, like the deep dark red velvet seats in the movie theater, would be used to signify boldness.

The movie theater plays a role in the film because it is the home of Giles (Richard Jenkins) and the amazing star of the film Elisa Esposito (Sally Hawkins). They live upstairs in small apartments.

Sally is a mute and works at a laboratory as a janitor. Her workmate, friend and protector is Zelda Fuller (Octavia Spencer). One day, when they are cleaning a secret room of the lab Sally is startled by the beast (Amphibian Man / Doug Jones) when she places her hand on a chamber he's being contained in. The amphibian has been captured and is being studied by Dr. Robert Hoffstetler (Michael Stuhlbarg) who is also happens to be a Russian spy.

The US government is trying to keep the amphibian secret and has hired Richard Strickland (Michael Shannon) to keep tabs on the creature. Strickland is cruel and thinks himself superior to everyone, especially Zelda and Elisa. He shows his cruelty by carrying around a cattle prod which he uses to  control the amphibian.

Eliza’s days are monotonous and the same. After sleeping; she gets up goes into the bathroom, masturbates in her tub, makes a sandwich for herself to take to work and one for her neighbor Giles (Richard Jenkins), goes to work, cleans the lab and bathrooms, returns home and spends time with Giles in his apartment where they watch dancing films on television.

Loved the scenes when Giles and Eliza do dance routines while sitting on the couch. Sweet and touching and added a heartfelt feeling to the characters.

Dancing is nice aspect of this film and it brings a lightness to this, otherwise, heavy film. The dance routines were directly from some of the films of the 1940s and 50s.

The obvious set-up is that Eliza feels a deep connection with the amphibian partially because they both don’t speak. However, they find a way of communicating with each other. She falls in love with him and is stressed because of the cruelty Strickland imposes on the amphibian. The question becomes, will she fight for the amphibian?

One of the failings of this film were the scars on Eliza’s neck. This detail was too obvious and allowed me to see the end before it came.

This film is a love story and in many ways, it really works well. I’m not sure of the necessity of having Hoffstetler be a Russian spy and I’m not sure why the pie store owner needed to be a racist. I just didn’t think it enhanced the story.

Hawkins was perfect for this role. Her clarity of purpose, her portrayal of being mute and desire to be seen as a person, was divine.  The development of her finding the strength to act on her love was compelling. One of the best performances of the year. Just as Hawkins was purposeful in her role, Shannon was equally intense as the man who wanted to control the amphibian. His driven personality to succeed at his job, his way, was perfectly played. Jenkins was great as the scared and scarred neighbor that had been let go from his job as product illustrator. Stuhlbarg was fantastic as the Russian agent who wanted science and this discovery to prevail over the wants of the Russian Government. Spencer was great as Eliza’s friend and protector. I sensed that writer and director Guillermo del Toro wanted this film to be both an interesting and emotional journey, but I found it lacking in interesting department, except when I was thinking about how the scenes were shot and the detail of the well-crafted pictures, like the cracked tile in Eliza’s bathroom. However, the direction by him of this cadre of actors was exquisite and keep me engaged.

Overall:  Although exquisitely beautiful in its crafting, it did not leave a lasting impression of greatness.

Wonder Wheel

First Hit:  Although well-acted, there's too much telling versus showing in this film.

I’m not a fan of longish monologues where the actor is telling their history to another actor as a way to tell the audience the necessary or semi-necessary information about themselves. It can work if kept to a minimum, but here it is incessant.

Much of what was told was unnecessary for the character to be seen more fully. The long monologue of Ginny (Kate Winslet) telling her lover Mickey (Justin Timberlake) as to why she felt like she was a disaster of a woman was totally unnecessary. It didn’t add to the film because Winslet is fully capable of making the audience believe her depth of sadness without all the information.

Additionally, I’m not a big fan of talking to the camera as a way to move the film along and to provide a backstory to what we are seeing and why. But Woody Allen (writer and director) felt it necessary to have Mickey talk to the camera several times and the first offense is at the beginning of the film which took me right out of film from the get go.

What we have is Ginny who is unhappily married to Humpty (Jim Belushi) who is an angry drunk so she keeps him sober. They're raising Ginny’s son Richie (Jack Gore) from a previous relationship. Richie is a handful because he’s a pyromaniac. Ginny feels both trapped and grateful for her current relationship with Humpty.

Humpty’s daughter Carolina (Juno Temple), from a previous marriage, shows up one day because she ratted out her gangster husband to the cops. She’s decides to visit her dad because she’s broke and because her husband won’t look for her at her dad's because of the strained relationship.

One day Ginny meets up and talks with Mickey and they start an affair. Hoping to enjoy love in her life once again, she becomes jealous when Carolina also becomes interested in Mickey.

This is the set-up and as we wade through lots of explanatory dialogue we a story is presented in the Coney Island boardwalk setting.

Winslet is excellent. It is her facial expressions that really shares the story despite all the lines and dialogue she's given. Belushi is perfect in this role. A barely educated guy who is a bit brutish, thinks the world of his wife, likes fishing and loves his daughter. Gore as the pyro son is an odd character in the film but he carries the role well. Timberlake is strong as the affable lifeguard who is honest in his dealings with the women. Temple is fantastic. I enjoyed her scenes and her look fit perfectly with the story. Allen wrote his typical screenplay filled with unnecessary justifying lines for the behavior of his characters. I really liked many of the sets and scenes that he put his characters in. The noise of the boardwalk and the overriding ragtime music set a wonderful tone.

Overall:  This is not one of Allen’s better films because the excessive dialogue got in the way.