Fifty Shades of Grey

Parkland

Directed by Peter Landesman. 

2013. Rated R, 93 minutes. 

Cast: 

Paul Giamatti 

James Badge Dale 

Zac Efron 

Colin Hanks 

Marcia Gay Harden 

Billy Bob Thornton 

Jacki Weaver 

Jackie Earl Haley 

Ron Livingston 

Jeremy Strong

As we were all reminded last year, during which the 50th anniversary of the event occurred, Pres. John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, TX on November 22, 1963. Parkland tells the story of what happened starting a few moments before he was shot until the time he was buried a few days later. The title refers to Parkland Memorial Hospital, where Pres. Kennedy was taken after being shot. We go there with him and go through the attempts to save his life, headed up by Dr. Jim Carrico (Efron), a very young doctor, and seasoned head nurse Doris Nelson (Harden). We see how first the Secret Service and then hordes of media folk descend upon Abraham Zapruder (Giamatti) when it becomes known that he caught the tragedy on film. We're also privy to the fed's handling of Lee Harvey Oswald (Strong) and his family. Finally, we deal with the shift in focus to protecting Lyndon B. Johnson who suddenly found himself President of the United States.

The fly on the wall perspective makes this about as close to being there as a movie is likely to get. To perpetuate that feeling, the camera is often in odd locations. A lot of times it is at a distance we would normally think of as too close. We can't make out much of the rooms these people are in. This is particularly true of the scenes in the operating room. It helps foster the feeling of being in a crowded space with almost no wiggle room. Outside the hospital, this technique hints at how little each person involved was really aware of, or could see from their vantage point.

In keeping with its documentary like survey of events, the acting is so good across the board it feels like we are watching the actual people live through a moment in history. Paul Giamatti and Marcia Gay Harden are, excellent as always. Billy Bob Thornton simply dominates the screen in one of his better, but bound to be underrated performances. Even Zac Efron impresses. His portrayal of Dr. Carrico rings true right from the start. In the film's showiest performance, Jacki Weaver is absolutely mind-blowing as Lee Harvey Oswald's mother Marguerite. She quickly becomes a person we love to hate, possibly even more than her son who killed arguably the most beloved U.S. president of the 20th century. Kudos to Weaver for completely selling it. Conversely, the person we most sympathize with is her other son Robert played with remorse for his brother's actions by James Badge Dale.

Clocking in at a shade under ninety minutes when you subtract the credits, it is a movie that moves at an extraordinary pace. It packs each frame to the gills and sprints by. As fast as it moves, it has no time to do what a lot of movies based on true events can. There is no theorizing about grassy knolls, second shooters, and the like. There also doesn't appear to be much in the way of agenda pushing. It just punches us right in the mouth with the most corroborated parts of a still mysterious story. It ends without any speculation whatsoever. Therefore, Parkland is certainly not the most contemplative JFK movie you'll ever see, but it's likely the most visceral one.

MY SCORE: 9/10

A Cat in Paris

Directed by Jean-Loup Felicioli.

2012. Rated PG, 70 minutes.

Cast:

Marcia Gay Harden

Steven Blum

JD Blanc

Anjelica Huston

Phillippe Hartmann

Matthew Modine

Gregory Cupoli

Lauren Weintraub

Dino is a cat that lives in Paris, hence the title. During the day he is under the care of Zoe (Weintraub), a little mute girl that that loves him deeply. Dino brings Zoe any dead creatures he can carry as a token of his appreciation. Zoe lives with her recently widowed mother Jeanne (Harden), a police officer specializing in catching bad guys and absentee parenting. Therefore most of her daughter’s time is spent with Claudine (Huston), the nanny. Oddly, the cat sneaks out of the house every evening and returns in the morning. The others know she leaves but haven’t a clue where she goes. We know that she goes across town to hang out with Nico (Blum) and accompanies him on his nightly burglaries. Eventually in the picture is Costa (Blanc), a ruthless art thief. We’re told he’s the one who killed Zoe’s father. The girl has not spoken a word since.

The seemingly separate strands of our plot are quickly established and work toward each other at a wonderful pace. The early scenes don’t dawdle endlessly, they make their point in a concise manner and provide us with neat foreshadowing. The whole thing is barely an hour long, a testament to its efficiency.

Efficiency without heart is a death knell for a movie. Luckily, this one does indeed have both. We can’t help but feel sorry for Zoe. Her mom is incessantly pre-occupied and her nanny seems well-meaning but can’t take the place of a child’s mother. Other than Dino, she has no friends and is having major trouble coping with her father’s death. Later, we project ourselves onto Nico and the relationship she develops with him.

Of course, with a cop and a bunch of criminals around, there’s bound to be some action. Most of it is back-loaded into the final act. Before this, an intriguing police procedural is well-mixed into a story that’s full, but not cluttered. Each section of the tale feels to be an organic part of the whole. There is some contrivance to get Costa into the story, but once in he’s so much fun we’re okay with it.

Another interesting aspect is the animation. Hand drawn, it’s less concerned with being a photo-realistic representation than it is with conveying feelings. For instance, Nico is a burglar and has to be sneaky therefore, he moves fluidly, snake-like. Costa, on the other hand, is a brute with a gang of henchmen. He moves accordingly. It may sound strange to say this about such an old style of storytelling but it’s a breath of fresh air among all the computer animated fare out there. Likewise for the storytelling on display. It sets a brisk pace and doesn’t pad its runtime with extraneous exposition and over-manipulation. It doesn’t beg you to keep up because it’s secure enough to know that you will. The ending leaves some loose ends but we’ve had such fun watching, we don’t really mind.

The Mist

Directed by Frank Darabont.
2007. Rated R, 125 minutes.
Cast:
Thomas Jane
Marcia Gay Harden
Laurie Holden
Andre Braugher

A thick, ominous mist rolls into a small-town carrying with it some strange and vicious creatures. We, the viewers, get to hang out with some of the local yokels who are trapped in the supermarket. Based on a Stephen King novella.

It’s well-written horror as it pertains to the humans. When the cast inevitably starts dying off it is with believable, though not always good, reasoning they venture out into the forbidding mist. The opposition between religious resignation to one’s fate and survivalist pragmatism is well done. As the suddenly crowned prophetess, Marcia Gay Harden does a fabulous job in a thankless role. It’s thankless because the movie itself is definitely not on her character’s side. Finally, even though I correctly predicted the ending well before it happened it still manages to work.

It’s poorly written crap with regards to the mist and its inhabitants. In Cloverfield it was okay to not find out anything about the giant creature destroying Manhattan because no one in the movie knew anything to tell. Here, there are clearly people who know what caused the problem. Before they can tell us anything we get the long ago played out tactic of them inexplicably dying or being found dead just as they were either about to tell us what’s going on or when it becomes apparent they know what’s going on. These people are military personnel and in fairness to them, and maybe an indictment of the screenwriters, it’s hardly likely that soldiers of their rank (mostly privates) would really know anything anyway. The creatures themselves are numerous. The smaller ones are fine and do some dastardly things. The larger ones do as well but they’re poorly rendered. They either move mechanically or are made up of easy to spot cartoonish looking CGI. The latter is true for the first monster we “see”. It appears to be a giant land-walking octopus but all we see are its enormous but very fake tentacles causing all sorts of mayhem. This happens very early in the movie but we never again hear a peep out of this particular menace. None of these monsters seem to have any rhyme or reason for their actions and are all powerful and deadly. Our heroes are trapped in a store that we’re explicitly told has a front made up of 100% plate glass. Yet somehow, this movie runs longer than two hours and covers several days. Um…yeah.

This is a frustrating movie to watch. During all the human to human tension-building scenes, the writing is exceptional for horror movies. However, when the focus is on the things that make it a horror movie we get nothing even remotely original and our big bad monsters look like crap. On top of that, if these monsters were as bad as they’re supposed to be then these people have been allowed to live for far too long. If you’re a horror fan or a Stephen King fan give it a shot and you might like it more than I. If creature-features aren’t your thing, skip it and rest easy with the knowledge you’re only missing okayness, not greatness.

MY SCORE: 5/10

Whip It

Directed by Drew Barrymore.
2009. Rated PG-13, 111 minutes.
Cast:
Ellen Page
Alia Shawkat
Marcia Gay Harden
Kristen Wiig
Juliette Lewis
Drew Barrymore
Jimmy Fallon
Eve
Carlo Alban
Ari Graynor
Zoe Bell
Landon Pigg

Plot: Bliss (Page), a small-town Texas high-school girl who hates the pageants her mother makes her compete in, discovers a new passion when she sneaks off to nearby Austin to join a roller-derby league.

The Good: Bliss feels like a real teenager. She’s not over-stylized and ultra-snarky like Juno (also played by Ellen Page). Nor is she super-happy and carefree. Her character is very well written as is that of her mom, played with stern faced resolve by Marcia Gay Harden. First time director Drew Barrymore paces her movie well. This enables the main characters to breath and places the roller derby scenes at nice intervals. And those scenes are quite fun.

The Bad: The relationship between Bliss’ parents is done a disservice. We get hints that there is much more below the surface, but we’re never shown. Basically, this boils down Dad’s reason for existence to one heroic action. Similarly, we learn curiously little about Bliss’ teammates on The Hurl Scouts. There’s plenty of potential for great characters and they’re given great names like Maggie Mayhem (Wiig) and Rosa Sparks (Eve) but it’s never taken advantage of. At the very least, we should’ve gotten to know the aforementioned Maggie a lot better.

The Ugly: Play number three.

Recommendation: It’s kinda the best of both worlds: a chick flick/sports movie. Sure, there are some clichés from both genres present, but it’s fun and engaging. Despite its faults, this is an enjoyable ride and a solid directorial debut for Barrymore.

The Opposite View: James Berardinelli, ReelViews

What the Internet Says: 7.1/10 on imdb.com (5/17/10), 84% on rottentomatoes.com, 68/100 on metacritic.com


MY SCORE: 7/10