Second Act

First Hit: Although very out-loud funny at times, the film seemed pressed to make a point.

Girl who’s had a hard life, is smart, but doesn’t get promoted because of her lack of education is the basis for this film.

Maya (Jennifer Lopez) has worked at a department store for years. She believes she’s up for promotion to be store manager. When the head of the company Weiskopf (Larry Miller) selects another candidate, a male who has an Ivy League degree, she’s pissed. Complaining to her closest friend Joan (Leah Remini), she talks about how unfair it is that her 18 years of experience don’t count.

As we learn from this conversation and others with her boyfriend Trey (Milo Ventimiglia) that Maya’s had a hard life. She bore a child at age 16, was homeless, never graduated from high school, and had to give up her child for adoption.

She’s sad about her hard life but doesn’t stop trying to make her life better. Joan’s older son decides to assist Maya by creating a new online profile filled with lies. She went to business school at Warton, speaks Mandarin, was coxswain on a Harvard rowing team. She also graduated summa cum laude. This impressive resume gets her an interview with Anderson Clarke (Treat Williams) for a consulting position at his large corporation.

He interviews Maya and hires her despite the objection of his daughter Zoe (Vanessa Hudgens). To earn her place in the company, Zoe challenges Maya to create a better product line than a line she can create.

Maya’s team consists of Hildy (Annaleigh Ashford), Ariana (Charlyne Yi) and Ron Ebsen (Freddie Stroma). Although Hildy drops out of the team, Ariana and Ron help to create success.

Many of the scenes are telegraphed as is the storyline. There are some very funny scenes, think kitchen dance with Otto (John James Cronin) leading the way. That’s on top of some snappy dialogue between Joan and Maya.

Lopez is good as Maya. She brings enough street smarts to the role to make it believable. Hudgens was good as Zoe. Her intimate discussions with Maya about their past were well done. Remini was excellent as the girlfriend. Her quips and spicy language made the story and film better. Williams was very good as the company owner. Ventimiglia was strong as the boyfriend coach who wants to get and stay close to Maya. Yi was excellent as the shy but kinky assistant. Stroma was very good as the creative leading scientist on Maya’s team. Justin Zackham and Elaine Goldsmith-Thomas wrote a predictable story. Peter Segal directed this film and he created an obviousness with this story that took all the suspense out of it, however, some of the funny scenes were out-loud funny.

Overall: The film was telegraphed all the way through and over acted.

Ben is Back

First Hit: Extremely well-acted story based on 24 hours of a mother and her addicted son’s return for the holidays.

I saw this film in two ways. The first and probably as intended; Ben Burns (Lucas Hedges) believes he’s doing well enough in his sobriety that he decides to come home and see his family. He believes this because he’s living in a sober halfway house, and has a sponsor.

The second came to me after Ben gives his mom Holly (Julia Roberts) and impassioned speech about how she doesn’t know him, he’s already lied to her about how his got ahold of some drugs. This view spawned a thought that his visit home was to find the hidden stash in the attic and he just really wanted to get high. The support for this is that he’s the one that suggested he go into the attic to get their old childhood decorations. An addict knows where their drugs are hidden.

At the end of the film I thought of this film in both views and even discussed these with my wife prior to writing this review – something I usually don’t do. One view of the film allows, at some level, Ben and even Holly to be victims of the addiction. The other view is reflective of how manipulative and devious the addict can be when they decide they are following a path to reuse.

Now, I suspect the film’s intention is not my second view, but that I can plausibly come up with this second view also tells me just how deep and reflective this film is about the story of a mom willing to do anything to save her son from his addiction, let alone the power of addiction.

Her anger towards the doctor who originally prescribed pain killers to her son because of an injury shows up at a food court in a shopping mall. That the doctor, now debilitated himself because of Dementia or Alzheimer’s, made no difference to Holly, she laid into him.

Briefly the story is that Ben decides on his own (think maybe story version 2), against his sponsor’s support, to come home for Christmas. His young step siblings, his step-father Neal Beeby (Courtney B. Vance), and his sister Ivy (Kathryn Newton) are very wary of his just showing up at their front door. They’re afraid of the stealing, lying, and disruption of Christmas because of their past experience.

Holly is overjoyed. She says she’s being cautious, but her heart is all in – Ben is Back.

There are tense moments throughout, but it is highlighted by the family’s return from the church play where Ivy sang lead and the step kids were an angel and lamb. Their home has been broken into and what is stolen is their dog Ponce. The dog is a family favorite and in-fact Ponce saved Ben from overdosing a couple of years earlier.

The people who took Ponce are trying to get Ben to visit them. This drug distributor was someone Ben use to work for as a dealer, but Ben also owes them a lot of money. With Ponce gone, the rest of the film is about Holly and Ben trying to find Ponce and bring him home.

As Ben takes charge of their search, he ends up doing one last act to get his family’s dog back. The price though is that he knows he’s wasn’t ready to visit the family and has now put everyone in jeopardy.

Many of the scenes were extremely well done. The bold family discussion about why Ben came back and Ivy feeling strong enough to voice her objection to Ben’s presence although she loves him dearly. The phone calls between Neal and Holly were both fraught and supportive of the dynamics they found themselves in with Ben’s return. The conversations in the car between Ben and Holly were powerful. The AA meeting Ben attends with Holly, spot on.

Roberts is outstanding as Holly. I love how well Julia Roberts can throw herself into a role and have the audience believe. I fully believed she was Holly. Hedges was sublime in this role. He’s had a great year with roles and to end with this one was perfect. I believed his addiction through his looks, his words, and his actions. His willingness to leave his mom alone at a gas station stop, told the story. Newton was powerfully excellent. Her fear of her brother’s actions and addiction were palpable. Vance was excellent as the caring, strong, and supportive stepfather. Peter Hedges, father of Lucas, both wrote and directed this story. His singular vision and use of powerfully strong actors to make the story come alive indicated his commitment to shine a light on both our opioid epidemic and our addictive culture.

Overall: This film is a powerful representative of what can happen to a family when addiction is present by one of its members. It is also a story of devotion of a mother’s love for her first-born son.

Roma

First Hit: Outside of the beautiful black and white photography and languid movement of the story, I left the theater with little.

This is a personal story. It is one from Director Alfonso Cuaron about his youth and for the person who raised him. Cuaron, raised in Mexico, opens the film with Cleo (Yalitza Aparicio) cleaning up a large home in the Colonia Roma neighborhood of Mexico City.

Cleo is one of two live-in housemaids for Sofia (Marina de Tavira) and Antonio (Fernando Grediaga), the mother, and mostly absentee father of four children. Cleo cares about the house and loves the children.

She meets a young man Fermin (Jorge Antonio Guerrero) who is part of a martial arts group. They spend intimate time together and she gets pregnant. He doesn’t want anything to do with a child and walks away from the relationship.

With Antonio deciding to leave his family, Sofia trying to hold the family together, and Cleo pregnant, the film drops in and out of the stories while framing each of the shots in very well framed sets.

The beach scene, the scene where Cleo visits Fermin’s martial arts class, and the last hospital scene are extremely touching and encapsulate the power of choices and situations of consequence.

Aparicio is excellent as Cleo. Her quiet demeanor and steadfast devotion to the family were wonderfully portrayed. Tavira as the mother was good. The moments of giving up and the moments of taking charge were subtle, yet palpable. Grediaga was OK in his small but pivotal role. The scene of him parking the car in the garage was wonderfully shot. Guerrero was strong as the boyfriend who disowned his relationship with Cleo. Cuaron created a powerfully visual film, but I had difficulty caring about the film in the end.

Overall: This movie seemed like a creation of love, although the audience to feel it might be small.

Vox Lux

First Hit: Intense film that’s different in its presentation as it echos a generation who’s losing touch with their heart while holding little hope.

There’s an eeriness that arrives as soon as the film begins. Not only do we see most of the credits before the film begins, which is a throwback to older times, it starts with a young man parking a truck, leaving it next to a building, then stalking away in the cover of darkness and wearing a hoodie.

With Willem Dafoe providing a narrative voice to set stage for each scene, the film moves through Celeste’s (played by both Raffey Cassidy as the younger Celeste and Natalie Portman) life. The first encounter is with the young man in their classroom where he walks in, shoots and kills the teacher,while attempting to set off a car bomb planted from the night before. Because the bomb fails to do the damage he’d hoped for, he starts shooting wanting to kill everyone in the classroom.

The film’s distinctive eeriness continues with how this film is shot. The scenes are elongated. This is demonstrated in the shooting scene with the response by the police and the haunting sound and flashing of the alarm penetrates the audience for much longer one would expect. This technique continues to the end of the movie with extended songs being sung by Celeste. These long scenes help to breathe life into a character that is somewhat devoid of life.

Affected by the shooting and after rehabbing to walk again, the film follows Celeste (Cassidy) and her sister Eleanor (Stacy Martin) as they write a song about the incident. Catching the ear of crusty and wizened Manager (Jude Law), they sell that song, along with others, to a record company.

Becoming famous, Celeste loses touch with reality and liveson the road. The only touch she has with her former life, as a young innocent God believing person, is her sister who takes care of her, is her only real friend and tries to protect her.

Jumping time, we meet Celeste (Portman) as a mid-thirties star, still singing pop songs that lack real meaning and messages but are popular. We learn that she’s had alcohol and drugs issues that were pranced in front of the public. She has a daughter named Albertine (Cassidy playing this role as well), and has other problematic public incidences including the death of a fan.

As Celeste bounces around in her chaotic life, it’s clear she has little touch with anything other than her own fame. She takes little responsibility for what she’s created around her.

This film makes a point that the younger generations are seeing a uselessness in the structures and institutions built from the past. There is a devaluation of life and there is a hollowness in the film and performances that reflect this disassociation with life.

Portman was excellent, for the most part. Her portrayal of this narcissistic deva with a level of hollowness was sublime. However, my hesitation of her performance is around her overly pronounced Long Island accent. The young Celeste has little or no accent, while the grown-up Celeste has a pronounced accent. I didn’t understand this and it plagued me as the film unfolded. Martin was excellent as the older sister. I liked how she moved through the film, providing support and guidance to Celeste, while supplicating herself to Celeste’s peculiarities. Cassidy was outstanding as both the young Celeste and then Celeste’s daughter Albertine. Law was strong as the pushy, crusty manager who looked out for himself more than Celeste. Brady Corbet both wrote and directed this film. There was an, interesting, detached, and modern feel to this story and film.

Overall: Days after seeing the film, I’m still processing the story and performances.

The Front Runner

First Hit: I liked the feel of the film in that it felt almost documentary like versus a deep dive into the character(s).

Like Gary Hart (Hugh Jackman) the candidate himself, the film didn’t go into his feelings or into the deeply personal aspects of the main character. Gary, as portrayed here, only wanted it to be about good ideas, a government that runs well, a government that focuses on people, and a strong ethical honest government.

The problem is that he didn’t think the public's opinion about his ethics towards his marriage and wife mattered. Gary comes across as if the big picture of what he represented for government was the only thing worth discussing and everything else he was above discussing. This was his downfall, because as we know, people must also relate to a Presidential candidate at a personal level as well and if they cannot, any flaws that are publicly played out will find a life of their own and possibly doom the candidacy.

His wife, Lee Hart (Vera Farmiga), liked her life living on a Colorado ranch and didn’t like engaging with and traveling with Gary as he campaigned for President. The scenes where Gary and Lee are together, were strong in how they related to each other at a level that worked for them and maybe it wasn’t typical.

In one scene, Lee states, “I only asked that you not embarrass me.” He did embarrass Lee and did so by attending a gathering of supporters on a boat called “Monkey Business” where he met a young woman named Donna Rice (Sara Paxton). The press then, and a little in the film, made fun of where he met Donna Rice, a young beautiful blonde and smart (graduated “summa cum laude”) woman. Hart’s disdain for the party and the people on the boat, except Donna, is aptly shown.

In press interviews, like on the boat, Gary only wanted to talk about the important stuff and this philosophy was echoed by his campaign manager Bill Dixon (J.K. Simmons). They didn’t want to appear on food shows or go to fairs in Iowa. He didn’t want to be asked about what he liked and, on the occasion, where he’d show up to a public event, like the lumberjack contest, he wanted to be seen as honest, strong, and the man with the answers who could also throw an axe.

The film floats, with distance from all the characters, from scene to scene. We pop into press briefings, strategy sessions, team meetings, telephone calls, press interviews. Everything is done with some distance except when Donna and Irene Kelly (Molly Ephraim) spend time together as Donna gets moved out of Washington DC, where she had a tryst with Gary, and back to Miami FL.

The scene when Donna goes down the escalator in Miami’s airport is heartbreaking because she’s alone and Irene can no longer help her. Irene sitting at the bar, is so telling.

With a slight distance, we watch newspaper editors discussing covering Hart and reporters doing their job of digging up stories that either support or do not support the candidate. The Washington Post reporter Roy Valentine (Nyasha Hatendi) interview with Gary and the press interview where Roy asks very poignant questions were very powerful scenes. The breakdown of Gary’s façade was perfect.

When his team learns, that Gary is leaving the presidential race, the team, who so believed in him, are disappointed, and it shows.

Jackman was excellent as the handsome, smart politician with great hair, Gary Hart. His ability to keep people at a distance, while drawing them in with his ideas was perfect. Farmiga was wonderful as Lee Hart. Her hurt was appropriately displayed while showing her strong independent nature as well. Hatendi was outstanding as the reporter learning the ropes of asking the hard questions. Loved the scene in the final press briefing Gary gave. Ephraim was sublime as the key woman on Gary’s campaign team, who also had a heart. When she asked Gary at dinner about how Donna was doing, his response showed so well on her face. Simmons was great as Gary’s campaign manager. His distaste for making it personal was perfectly aligned with Gary’s view of the world, until it didn’t. Paxton was wonderful as Donna. I loved her telling Irene about her previous boyfriends over drinks. Matt Bai, Jay Carson, Jason Reitman wrote a strong telling script that was well executed by director Reitman.

Overall: I liked how story played out on film.