REVIEW: “Marriage Story”

December 26, 2019 by Keith Garlington

The title of Noah Baumbach’s emotionally-charged, fractured-family drama “Marriage Story” is dripping with irony. It could more accurately be called a divorce story, but one full of personal reflections on a marriage that was. It’s also one of the rawest and most authentic looks at divorce ever put on screen. Obviously that doesn’t make it an easy watch, but it is an incredibly affecting one.

But there is a better way to read the title. It could just as easily be a reference to the stories told by the two leads to friends, therapists, and eventually lawyers. Their stories are rooted in their perspectives of what went wrong with their marriage and with what drove them to such a contentious split. And in one of the sadder turns, they eventually lose control of their stories to the lawyers who ensure things only get uglier and more painful.

While not all of Baumbach’s movies emotionally register with me, they’re never boring and they display an unabashed humanity that never comes across as disingenuous. His “Marriage Story” script is one of the most real and brutally honest works of his career. He puts aside the acid-tongued wit for more verisimilitude and veracity. But that doesn’t mean the humor isn’t there. The moments of levity Baumbach injects are welcomed and also quite funny.

I love the way the film opens. A New York couple (which becomes a significant point of debate later on) take turns telling us what they love about each other. It’s sweet, heartfelt, and organic. But it’s also Baumbach throwing us a curveball. It turns out that the words are part of an exercise they’re doing for a separation therapist. The session doesn’t go well and we quickly sense the couple’s relationship has reached the point of no return.

While Baumbach’s script is among the year’s best, his character-driven story hinges on its two Oscar-caliber lead performances. Adam Driver plays Charlie, an avant-garde stage prodigy whose small theater company is on the verge of hitting it big. His lead actress is his wife Nicole (Scarlett Johansson), a former teen movie up-and-comer who left her film career behind to help Charlie produce plays in New York. The two get married and have a son Henry (Azhy Robertson).

But we learn that over a fairly short period of time their marriage has crumbled. They agree to handle their separation amicably and without involving lawyers. Nicole is offered the lead role in a new television pilot so she leaves the theater and flies to Los Angeles with Henry. Charlie, naively thinking Nicole’s move is temporary, stays in New York preparing his play for its big Broadway debut.

In LA Nicole breaks the news to her mother (the delightfully spacey Julie Hagerty) and her high-strung big sister (Merritt Wever), both of who are divorced themselves. While on the set of her new show Nicole is convinced by one of her producers (who also happens to be divorced) to hire high-profile celebrity attorney Nora Fanshaw (yep, divorced). She’s shrewd, cut-throat and played with unbridled confidence by a fantastic Laura Dern.

When Charlie flies to LA to see Henry he’s blindsided with divorce papers from Nicole and told to lawyer-up tossing their previous agreement out the window. The first attorney Charlie meets (Ray Liotta) plays dirty like Nora but is too expense (and looks to be divorced). So he settles for a semi-retired family lawyer named Bert Spitz (Alan Alda in another great bit of casting). He’s far more easy-going and appeasing. Oh, and he has been divorced three times! Do you sense a trend?

As the lawyers become more involved things get nastier and Baumbach wisely lets it play out at a very natural pace. We are fed bits of information through conversations and confessions that give us a clearer vision of both Charlie and Nicole. They’re both flawed and with the exception of one sin Charlie commits (which I could have done without) its easy for us to be empathetic. The movie maintains a delicate balance, making no judgments and keeping our sympathies shifting back-and-forth. But overall we can’t help but root for both.

So we end up with a heart-wrenching account of a crumbled relationship, the ugliness of the divorce process, and its sad, complex aftermath. Baumbach drives his story with rich narrative detail, often building to scenes of painful, visceral release. Take what may be the film’s signature sequence where an argument between Nicole and Charlie savagely escalates to a devastating crescendo. The script’s candor along with the ferocity of both Driver and Johansson makes for a bruising exchange. It’s tough to watch but it is mesmerizing cinema.

“Marriage Story” has a lot to say about modern marriage and with such painfully high divorce numbers it’s sure to resonate with a great many people. And as we sit back and observe this cross-country separation Baumbach gives us lots to consider: relationships are tough, splitting up is tougher, and for some lawyers divorce is a lucrative business. More importantly he reminds us that those effected are real people and no one is left unscathed.

VERDICT – 4.5 STARS

Merry Christmas!

December 25, 2019 by Keith Garlington

I’m taking one day away from movies to wish you all a very Merry Christmas. I’ll be spending the day enjoying family, exchanging gifts, and of course eating a lot of food. It also gives me yet another opportunity to thank you all for reading, liking, commenting and supporting this little ol’ site of mine. It means a lot.

Merry Christmas and God bless.

REVIEW: “The Christmas Chronicles” (2018)

December 24, 2019 by Keith Garlington

They had me at Kurt Russell as Santa Claus. You heard me right. The bushy-faced Russell is a hoot playing the jolly old elf in the big red suit. It’s a hilarious bit of casting and it’s surprising just how well it works. While it’s Russell who steals the show, “The Christmas Chronicles” puts most of its focus on a struggling Massachusetts family.

Co-producer Chris Columbus is no stranger to Christmas films (“Home Alone”, “Home Alone 2”, “Christmas with the Kranks”, “Jingle All the Way”). Here he teams with animator turned director Clay Kaytis. Their film follows a brother and sister whose relationship has soured since the death of their father.

For Kate (Darby Camp) and her older brother Teddy (Judah Lewis), life at home was a joy especially during Christmas time. Their fireman father (Oliver Hudson) was a fountain of Christmas cheer that always overflowed to his wife Claire (Kimberly Williams-Paisley) kids. But when he is killed in the line of duty his family begins to crack under the weight of grief.

That’s pretty much the setup for what is the bulk of the story. Kate and an disinterested Teddy craft a plan to catch Santa in the act of delivering his goodies. Things don’t exactly go as planned and (as is often the case in these things) their actions unintentionally threaten to derail Christmas. But after meeting Santa face-to-face, the three join up to try and save the night before it’s too late.

Don’t be mistaken, there is still the sentimental sappiness you expect from these types of movies. Not the Hallmark Channel variety (thank goodness). But the kind that flows from the insatiable yuletide spirit the majority of these movies embrace. As a festive person I’ll admit this usually works for me. But I can see where certain Scrooges in the audience might not be as forgiving.

“The Christmas Chronicles” is a fun, spry holiday movie that should fit nicely onto your Christmastime watchlist. Just don’t go in expecting it to break new ground. It’s predictable and it strikes nearly every familiar Christmas movie chord. At the same time it has an undeniable charm not to mention it’s a little bizarre. I mean Kurt Russell Santa on the lam for grand theft auto? Who wouldn’t watch that?

VERDICT – 3.5 STARS

REVIEW: “Clemency” (2019)

December 24, 2019 by Keith Garlington

Chinonye Chukwu’s upcoming film “Clemency”channels a lot of information through its opening shot. We see Bernadine Williams, the warden of a maximum security prison, on her way to oversee a execution by lethal injection. She walks with steadying confidence yet her eyes reveal something different. Bernadine is burdened and her job’s psychological toll is evident.

“Clemency” is the second film releasing in the next few weeks dealing with the death penalty (the other being Destin Daniel Cretton’s “Just Mercy”). Chukwu’s film looks at it through the eyes of Bernadine who is played by Alfre Woodard. It’s a powerful and emotionally layered performance that gives us a window into the process while also offering a character study of a woman so tightly wound that she could blow at any second.

The opening scene uncoils in a truly visceral way and the impact of it reverberates throughout the remainder of the film. With an icy cold professionalism and a by-the-books approach Bernadine orders her officers through each step of a young man’s execution. She puts on a good show. You can see she’s done this a dozen times before and she knows the procedure like the back of her hand. But when the execution is botched it reveals a crack in her facade which only becomes more pronounced as the story moves forward.

Bernadine’s position as warden doesn’t allow for her to wrestle with any feelings or emotions. She has to be ready for the next execution (in this case a young death row inmate named Anthony Woods played by Aldis Hodge). So it’s her relationship with her husband Jonathan (Wendell Pierce) that ends up taking the brunt of her aloofness. “I need a pulse” he pleads realizing their marriage is on life support. But Bernadine quietly crumbles before his and our eyes, trapped in a personal hell and completely unable to convey her feelings. “I am alone, and nobody can fix it” she painfully affirms.

Chukwu (working as both writer and director) uses Woods and his desperate attempts at clemency to dig deeper into Bernadine’s poorly-veiled misery. Several others around her are retiring, worn down by the weight of their jobs, including the prison chaplain (Michael O’Neill) and even Woods’ attorney (Richard Schiff). But Bernadine resists, unwilling to walk away from her job and all the work it took to get it, especially as an African-American woman.

“Clemency” is a movie full of brutally honest moments, and so many of them are also the quietest. Chukwu will often allow her camera to sit and observe her characters, carefully framing her shot and then trusting the performances to do the rest. It’s why having Alfre Woodard is such a strength. She’s able to convey so much feeling in a simple stare. And in a movie with this much heavy material, that kind of lead performance is priceless.

VERDICT – 4 STARS

REVIEW: “Richard Jewell”

December 23, 2019 by Keith Garlington

The real story of Richard Jewell is both heartbreaking and infuriating. Jewell was a security guard during the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. While working an evening of concerts at Centennial Olympic Park he discovered a suspicious backpack containing a bomb. He was instrumental in moving people out of the area just before the bomb detonated.

Many lives were saved and Jewell was instantly heralded as a hero. But it all changed when the FBI suddenly made him their prime suspect despite having no evidence to charge him. Information was leaked to the media who unfairly presumed his guilt and spent weeks demonizing him in print and on television. Jewell was eventually exonerated but not before it all had taken a terrible toll.

Clint Eastwood directs the simple-titled “Richard Jewell” which follows this aspiring ‘law enforcement officer’ through the events that would alter his life forever. The film stars Paul Walter Hauser as the title character, a Michigan native who sports a pretty impressive Deep South accent. Eastwood and screenwriter Billy Ray dig a little into Richard’s past but mainly focus on Olympic Park bombing, the FBI’s shady work to pin it on Richard, and the media’s aggressive rush to convict him through their reporting.

The film portrays Richard as a gentle and well-meaning guy. He’s shown to be naive and unassuming to a fault which FBI agent Tom Shaw (John Hamm) will later exploit regardless of the legality. We also see that Richard sometimes takes things too seriously (which costs him his job as a college campus cop). Hauser’s spot-on performance captures all of Jewell’s kindness but also his eccentricities which leads to him being perceived as sympathetic and at times pitiful.

Hamm’s Agent Shaw was on duty at Centennial Olympic Park when the bomb went off. Bitter that it happened on his watch, Shaw is selfishly motivated to pin it on the man being called a hero. He has a ‘mutually beneficial’ relationship with Kathy Scruggs (Olivia Wilde), a cutthroat journalist with the Atlanta-Journal Constitution who is more interested in getting the scoop first than testing the truthfulness of it.

You kinda expect Hamm to be good considering he has done variations of this role several times before. But Wilde stands out the most, vividly portraying a character who is brash, tenacious and boiling over with confidence. She’s unspeakably devious but just as intelligent. Both of their characters are implicit in hounding Richard and starting the firestorm of negative and in some cases abusive reporting (one paper gives him the title “Bubba Bomber”).

This opens the narrative door for two other great supporting performances. Sam Rockwell is fantastic playing Richard’s attorney Watson Bryant. The two men first cross paths early in the movie and then reconnect after Watson agrees to defend Richard against the unfounded allegations. And Kathy Bates is a real scene-stealer playing Richard’s mother Bobi. It’s an earnest, grounded performance and it’s easy believing in her as a caring and supportive mom.

“Richard Jewell” moves at a surprisingly snappy pace despite taking a while to show any real emotional conviction. It does a good job establishing its characters, but much like the movie’s namesake, it’s easygoing when it comes to emotions and a little too absorbed in the details. But Eastwood finally gives us a much earned payoff in a strong final act where Hauser, Bates, and Rockwell really humanize the story. I just wish we didn’t have to wait so long get there.

VERDICT – 3.5 STARS

REVIEW: “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker”

December 20, 2019 by Keith Garlington

What a roller-coaster adventure the last two years have been for Star Wars fans. Fair or not, Rian Johnson’s “The Last Jedi” sparked all sorts of fan backlash, enough to prompt some to even blame it for the 2018 “Solo” movie’s disappointing box office numbers. Without question much of the outrage was over-the-top which caused many of the legitimate criticisms to be lost in the noise. But equally over-the-top was the critical praise, some of which heralded it as “the best Star Wars movie ever made”. Much of that was rooted in a needless lust for subversion and rabid contempt for fandom.

In reality “The Last Jedi” had problems but it wasn’t the franchise killing disaster some have painted it as. Actually, outside of about 30 minutes of wildly uneven (and arguably bad) storytelling, it’s a movie with an assortment of big thrills and exciting moments. More importantly it left the story in a promising place and gave the characters plenty to reckon with. It ultimately set the table for “Rise of Skywalker” and the return of director and co-writer J.J. Abrams.

Abrams clearly listened to the criticisms which has already triggered the predictable whines of “fan service” from certain critic circles. But Star Wars has always been about continuity and connection. Even the “stand-alone” movies are inherently connected to the films that came before them. So it makes sense that Abrams would try to rein in some of Johnson’s care-free creative choices. And as a movie tasked with wrapping up an entire four decade-plus saga, you almost have to expect some level of “fan service”.

Here’s the important thing, the “fan service” we get in Episode IX isn’t half-baked or intrusive. Most of it is entertaining, nostalgic, and ultimately satisfying. Cool callbacks of all kinds pop up throughout the movie, lots of it genuinely in service to the story while other bits are simply there for the fun of it. Do they go a little overboard? Perhaps. But whether or not it is a dealbreaker for you probably depends on how you’re approaching this film as a whole.

“Skywalker” gets off to a shaky (and frankly concerning) start. The first twenty minutes or so sees Abrams and co-writer Chris Terrio bouncing us from one location to another while never letting us plant our feet. There is some snazzy scenery and a couple of decent action sequences, but they’re kinda lost in the film’s manic rush to get the story and the characters to where they need to be. But once the narrative pieces are put in place, the movie slows down a bit and gets into a more manageable rhythm.

The movie’s most captivating storyline remains the mysterious connection between young and raw Jedi extraordinaire Rey (Daisy Ridley) and tortured dark sider Kylo Ren (Adam Driver). Rey works hard to hone her skills but is still haunted by questions of her identity. Kylo (who steals the movie) uses every ounce of rage he can muster to smother out the glimmer of light within him. Both Ridley and Driver approach most of their scenes with a steely intensity befitting of their characters and their inevitable collision course.

As for another big plus, “Skywalker” finally gives the trilogy’s heroes some meaningful screentime together. Rey, Poe (Oscar Isaac), Finn (John Boyega), Chewbacca (Joonas Suotamo), C-3PO (Anthony Daniels), and of course BB-8 go off on a Sinbad-like quest (look that reference up kids) to find an artifact once sought by Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill). It’s believed to contain the location of a Wayfinder that will lead them to a Sith planet where a new dark force has emerged.

It turns out Kylo Ren has a Wayfinder of his own and has ventured to the sinister planet. While there he discovers a way to turn his terrorizing First Order into a bigger and truly unstoppable force. But it requires that he kill his one biggest threat – Rey. So as the rag-tag band of heroes look for a way to the Sith planet, the First Order scours the entire galaxy in pursuit of them.

Despite the seriousness of their mission, there are always moments of levity especially between playful best bros Poe and Finn. But it’s C-3PO who turns out to be the biggest ham. He’s the perfect punchline for several jokes but he also has some cracking comedic lines of his own. It’s just a shame R2-D2 was left back at the Rebel base with practically nothing to do. The same could be said for Lando (Billy Dee Williams). Who wasn’t thrilled to see the good-hearted gambler returning to the franchise? But he just conveniently pops up with little explanation and then quickly fades into the background.

And as you might expect, we get several new characters entering the galaxy far, far away for the first time. Among the best, Keri Russell’s Zori Bliss, a shady old acquaintance of Poe’s. It’s not a big role, but Zori has a background fans will love to explore. Richard E. Grant is a hoot playing the sour and ever-serious Allegiant General Pryde of the First Order. Grant chews up his lines in classic imperial officer fashion. We don’t quite get enough of his story, but he’s a fun and interesting presence. And Star Wars knows how to do droids. New here is D-O, affectionately called “conehead” by Poe. Again, small role but tender and quite funny.

Abrams does do some patchwork to several of Rian Johnson’s more controversial choices: Rey’s parents, Supreme Leader Snoke, etc. The movie addresses them in a way that should please many of the fans while infuriating those who couldn’t care less about Star Wars continuity or lore. But let’s be serious, “The Rise of Skywalker” had no chance of pleasing everyone. It was a hopeless proposition. So, do you follow Johnson’s lead and kick more sand in the eyes of long-time fans? Or do you make a movie for the devoted fanbase and face the ire of scorned critics?

Sadly, an unnecessary chasm between critics and fans is all but certain and is already blazing across social media. The film will probably be held to a ridiculously high standard (by fans AND critics) and unhelpful comparisons to the original trilogy are all but inevitable. It’s a shame because “Rise of Skywalker” is pure entertainment – fun, at times thrilling, with a steady tinge of franchise nostalgia and an emotional punch at the end. It’s far from perfect. The story is messy, there’s enough plot to fill two movies, and some of its characters need more attention. But this is still very much a Star Wars film and will evoke many of those same old feelings of kid-like joy and excitement for those who allow it.