24th Jan2014

Inside Llewyn Davis – Film

by timbaros

images-81Inside Llewyn Davis is a quiet, downbeat, and different type of movie about a musician who can’t get a break, neither in his musical career nor in his life.

Oscar Isaac excellently plays Davis, a talented folk singer/songwriter in 1960’s Greenwich Village who always seems to have a dark cloud over his head. Loosely based on a book by American folk singer Dave Van Ronk (“Mayor of MacDougal Street”) and directed and written by brothers Joel and Ethan Coen, Inside Llewyn Davis tells the simple tale of Davis as he tries to navigate life with his guitar as his best friend.
Davis, who is practically homeless and will jump at the chance to take perform at any gig for money, lives from sofa to sofa, including one that belongs to his ex-girlfriend Jean (Carey Mulligan) and her new partner Jim (Justin Timberlake). Together on the music circuit they are known as Jean and Jim. However, Jean informs Davis that she is pregnant, and that the kid could potentially be his. In another apartment that he sleeps in, he, along with the house cat, both get locked out, so he takes the cat (Ulysses) with him on the subway to gigs and to other people’s apartments, including Jean’s, where the cat slips out the window. His sister, who has lent him lots of money, doesn’t have much faith in his singing career. So in the quest to get some money and to get himself heard, he hitches a ride to Chicago (with a cat that may or may not be the cat that was lost) with musicians Johnny Five (Grant Hedlund) and Roland Turner (John Goodman) to meet a club owner who doesn’t give much hope to Davis and his career. And such is the life of Davis. He returns back to New York only to face more bad luck, enough bad luck that he plans to abandon his music career and join the merchant marines.
Davis (who was previously seen in W.E. and Drive) is excellent in this role. He has won several film critics awards for this film, including the National Society of Film Critics Awards for Best Actor. Sadly, he was not nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor. More shocking is that the music for this film was ignored by the Academy. The true star of Inside Llewyn Davis is the music – a mix of old and original folk songs by the legendary T-Bone Burnett. The BAFTA’s got it right – the film is nominated for Best Original Screenplay (deservedly so), Best Cinematography, and Best Sound (but shockingly again, nothing for its music). The film itself won the Grand Prixe at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival. Although in color, Inside Llewyn Davis has a smoky hazy look about it, almost like a reflection of dark clouds over a man who goes from rags to rags and no riches. Cinematographer Bruno Delbonnel perfectly captures this mood. Inside Llewyn Davis is one of the most memorable films you will see all year.

 

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24th Jan2014

Grudge Match – Film

by timbaros
images-80Raging Bull. Rocky. Robert DeNiro. Sylvester Stallone. Put these two legendary actors together in the same film, about boxing no less, and you think you would you have a classic in the making. Unfortunately, it’s more like an overcooked turkey.

DeNiro and Stallone play old boxing rivals who come out of retirement for one final match. DeNiro is Billy “The Kid” McDonnen and Stallone plays Henry “Razor” Sharp. Back in 1983, when each man had won a fight against the other, Razor suddenly announced his retirement on the eve of their decisive match. So thirty years later, in Pittsburgh where both boxers are from and now live, this match is finally going to happen, thanks to local ‘boxing promoter’ Dante Slate Jr. (Kevin Hart). At first it is not easy convincing each of them to go through with it. They are no longer in the good shape like they used to be oh so many years ago, and they’ve fallen into obscurity. However, Sharp could use the money to supplement his job of working in a mill, welding steel, and his hobby of turning scraps of metal into tiny animal sculptures. It is McDonnen who used his money wisely to become a successful businessman. But there is more unfinished business issues between both men – and her name is Sally (Kim Bassinger). Sally had a son with McDonnen but ended up in a relationship with Sharp. Now she has come out of the woodwork to get back together again with Sharp.
In promoting the fight, Sharp and McDonnen are asked to put on interactive body suits for a video boxing game, but the shoot gets out of hand as both men come to blows with each other, all of which is captured in the crews’ video phones. The footage goes viral, and before you know it, their fight becomes bigger than expected. Sharp enlists his trainer from the 1980’s, Louis “Lighting” Conlon (a very funny Alan Arkin – whose actually had never met nor worked with DeNiro and Stallone before this film) to get him into shape for the upcoming fight. Conlon is still as feisty as ever, even though he is in a wheelchair. He moves in with Sharp to watch his every move, training him in old school style. He puts Sharp through the paces, pool punching, flipping tires, pulling big rigs, and having him dip his fists in horse urine to toughen his skin. McDonnen, meanwhile has a useless personal trainer at the gym, so he enlists the son that he had with Sally, BJ (Jon Bernthal) who becomes his personal trainer after a few typical ‘father you weren’t there for me when I grew up’ scenes. BJ has a son Trey (Camden Gray) who provides the expected and prerequisite warm and fuzzy scenes, and who also is around when McDonnen says one too many BJ jokes, and also creating a double father-son element to the story.
The best part of the film is the actual match at the end of the movie. Sharp enters the ring dressed in classic black and white while McDonnen sports his trademark cloverleaf on the back of a sparkling emerald green Italian silk robe and black trunks, with more than 5,000 hand-beaded Swarvoski-crystals. And believe it or not, Stallone and DeNiro did all of their own boxing, making the match all the more real.
Say what you will, Grudge Match is a semi-funny but not hilarious film. I wonder why two screen legends – DeNiro and Stallone – would need to make a film such as this? They both first worked together in 1997’s acclaimed film Copland, a very dramatic film. Grudge Match is the complete opposite. Did both men just want to have fun and a good time by making this film? Stallone is 67 and Robert De Niro is 70, and while they both are in good shape for the age, it is painful to watch them in a film with an extremely bad script. As they both played boxers in the past, did they want to have closure? While of course Grudge Match won’t harm their careers, it is not just what you would expect from these screen legends. Sure, Stallone has made some turkeys in his time, and DeNiro’s last two films – The Family and Last Vegas – were both not very well received, but will the public embrace them, and this film, like a walk down memory lane? In a few of the flashback scenes, DeNiro and Stallone’s faces were digitally re-aged to place them on young fighters bodies. Ah, the good old days, when both men were making good movies.

 

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24th Jan2014

Red 2 – DVD

by timbaros

images-79If you liked Red, then you will love Red 2, which picks up where Red left off.

Former CIA covert operations agent Frank Moses (Bruce Willis) Retired, Extremely Dangerous (RED), happy in his retirement and peaceful life with his girlfriend Sarah (Mary-Louise Parker), is dragged back into work to search for a new biological weapon called Nightshade.

It went missing from the Cold War during Frank and his partner Marvin’s (John Malkovich) watch, and has since resurfaced, and everyone, the good guys and the bad guys, believes that they know it’s whereabouts. To complicate matters, a hit has been put on them from M16, and agent Victoria (none other than (Helen Mirren) informs them that she has been contracted to shoot and kill them. She even dons a Queen’s crown as one of her disguises.

Meanwhile, a corrupt government official (Neal McDonough) is sending another contract killer, Han (Byung Hun Lee), who has an old score to settle with Frank, to kill them. Then, Frank’s old flame Katja (Catherine Zeta-Jones) shows up to further complicate matters. It is up to certified crazy scientist Edward Bailey (a Hannibal Lechter-like Anthony Hopkins), who knows a thing or two about Nightshade, and possibly knows it whereabouts, to help save the gang, as well as the rest of the world from annihilation.

Red 2 is an action/adventure/thriller as much as a James Bond film is, however, Red 2 (just like Red) has an added element – comedy – seen a few times when Sarah is not able to fire a pistol or drive a car, or the banter between her and Frank when they are caught in sticky situations. Marvin and Frank have their funny moments as well, one of them being when Marvin pretends to die and Frank is tempted to pinch his skin in the coffin to make sure he was really dead. (He wasn’t.)

Much better than the last James Bond film, Skyfall, Red 2 pulls out all the stops and provides the viewer with one hell of a 116-minute ride. Not once does the action, adventure and comedy stop. And with this all star cast of heavyweights – Willis, Mirren, Zeta-Jones, Hopkins, Malkovich, and even Parker, makes Red 2 the perfect summer film.

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24th Jan2014

Any Day Now – DVD

by timbaros

images-78Rudy Donatello works as a drag queen by night but still finds it tough to make ends meet. Out of the blue Paul Fleiger (Garret Dillahunt) walks into the bar and into his life, while at the same time, the boy next door is having family problems, in the new gay drama Any Day Now.

Donatello, played sympathetically and with gusto by Alan Cumming, sings at a gay nightclub in 1979 West Hollywood with two other drag queens who are his back up singers. One night, Fleiger walks into the bar and is immediately smitten with Donatello. Why? It is not clear. Perhaps it is love first sight? Meanwhile, Donatello’s next door neighbor, Marianna (Jamie Anne Allman), is a drug dealer and sex addict who has a young son who has down’s syndrome. One night she gets arrested, leaving her son alone in the apartment. Donatello discovers the boy alone, so he has the boy come to stay with him temporarily until the situation with his mother becomes more clear. Meanwhile, the relationship with Fleiger is getting more and more serious, with both men quickly falling in love with each other.

Social services ends up getting involved and puts Marco into a foster home, making Donatello realize that he and Fleiger are fit to take care of the boy, especially after Fleiger asks Donatello to move in with him, thereby providing a stable home for Marco. However, social services thinks otherwise and digs out every dirty detail they can find about Donatello and Fleiger’s relationship to make them look like unfit parents, gay being one of the details. When the mother is suddenly sprung from jail in a plea bargain with the district attorney, with all the counts dropped, all hope seems to be lost in keeping Marco.

Any Day Now is a truly sympathetic and a well done and very current film on the trouble that gay couples have in adopting children.

Cumming gives one of his finest performances in years as the drag queen by night who at first seems lost in life but then finally finds happiness and a family at the same time. Girant, an American actor previously seen in Killing Me
Softly and Winter’s Bone, is also very good as a closeted lawyer who very slowly comes out after finding love with a man for the first time, building his confidence. More a revelation is Isaac Leyva as Marco. An actor with Down’s Syndrome, his performance is so touching, so emotional, so professional that acting seems to be natural for him. The script, by Director Travis Fine and George Arthur Bloom, is very timely and believable, while Fine’s direction is sharp and crisp. Any Day Now is a very touching and moving film.

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