AWCH Film Reviews -- February 2006

(Osanna V) Opening February 2, 2006

Based on the Nurse Matilda bedtime stories by Christianna Brand, Nanny McPhee is directed by Kirk Jones (Waking Ned) and stars Emma Thompson and Colin Firth. The screenplay was written by Thompson.

Mr. Brown (Firth) is an undertaker and widower with seven adorable, clever, but very naughty children, whose primary aim in life seems to be scaring away the latest nanny employed to look after them. Their father is at his wits end, as is the cook, Mrs. Blatherwick (Imelda Staunton); only Evangeline (Kelly MacDonald), the house maid, seems able to deal with them to some degree, probably because she is genuinely fond of them. Around the chaos that fills Mr. Brown's life looms the formidable figure of his wealthy aunt Adelaide (Angela Lansbury), who supplements the family's income but who has now set an ultimatum: her nephew must marry again within the month or else she will cut him off. This would send him into debt, meaning he would go to prison and the children to foster families.

Mr. Brown is desperate, but magical help in on its way in the form of Nanny McPhee (Thompson). Far from your Mary Poppins type, Nanny McPhee is shockingly ugly: heavy brows, two big, hairy warts on her face, a bulbuous nose and a tooth that sticks out unpleasantly over her bottom lip. She quickly assesses the situation and announces that the children need her and that she will stay. Overwhelmed but relieved by McPhee's apparent competence, Mr. Brown puts his attention to the task of finding a new wife.

Nanny McPhee's methods are definitely unorthodox; a mixture of magic and Zen Buddhism! She quickly informs the children that she will "stay as long as they want her to leave, and leave as soon as they want her to stay". She has five lessons to teach them: to say please; to go to bed at night when they're told; to get up in the morning on time; to listen; and to do what is right. To the children's amazement, as each lesson is learnt another of Nanny McPhee's ugly features disappears.

In the meantime, Mr. Brown has found his future wife: Mrs. Quickly (Celia Imrie). Inevitably, she fits perfectly the children's image of a "wicked stepmother", so their pranks are now turned towards someone other than the nanny...

Nanny McPhee has a magical, fairytale quality that makes it a delightful choice for family entertainment. Emma Thompson is, as always, excellent, as are no less the rest of the cast.

(Karen P) Opening February 2, 2006

Based on the books Man in Black and Cash: An Autobiography, the film Walk the Line follows the early years of Johnny Cash (Joaquin Phoenix), beginning with his childhood days, on a small cotton farm in Arkansas during the depression. In spite of his hard life as a sharecropper’s son, he was happy as long as he had his big brother by his side with whom he shared everything – including his two secret loves. His first love was for music and the second was the voice of June Carter (Reese Witherspoon). He faithfully listened to the Carter family gospel sing-a-long on the weekly radio hour. Johnny’s childhood dreams begin to fall apart when his brother tragically leaves his world. This tragedy was the catalyst that spurred Johnny’s song writing lyrics: hard-luck characters seeking faith and redemption.

While serving in the army in the Germany, Johnny purchased a guitar and became a self taught musician. He wrote one song dealing with life in prison. After his army days, he headed for Memphis, Tennessee, to pursue his career in gospel music. He stumbled upon a small recording studio, Sun Studios, which asked for $4.00 a recording. Johnny was so bad that the studio refused to make his recording. Rejection was not apart of Cash’s plan so he broke out his prison song and blew the studio manager away with his burly, storytelling-style of music. According to Sun Studios, the young Cash was "good-to-go" for the 1956 Caravan Tour featuring Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Roy Oribson, Waylon Jennings and June Carter. Johnny’s draw was his deep, booming, gravel voice, his life-applicable songs of hard work and human worth, and no one will forget the awesome way he would aim his guitar at the audience. June’s draw was her stand-up comic relief that held the tours together. She was their glue!

Seven years in the making, director James Mangold had the privilege of allowing Johnny and June to critique the first three drafts of this project, to allow them to assist in choosing the actors and to be influenced by their life history before their deaths in 2003. Mangold felt it was fitting to use the title of one of Johnny’s most loved songs because it personified his own struggle to stay on the right path in order to be a good man. Johnny felt that it was a job that he had to work at every single day.

Mangold grabs a hold of a window of opportunity with his film Walk the Line in order to unveil a magical love affair with a timeless style of music and its pioneers. He personifies his narrative by using the early part of the personal stories of J.R. Cash and June Carter Cash as they rose from the birth of Rock and Roll music and held on to a ten year love affair that was only allowed to take place on stage.

(Kirsten G) Opening February 2, 2006

Eclectic Canadian director Atom Egoyan (The Sweet Hereafter, Ararat) tries out noir in his latest film, Where the Truth Lies. Based on the 1997 novel by Rupert Holmes, Lies jumps back and forth between the 50s and the 70s, chronicling the rise and fall of Lanny Morris (Kevin Bacon) and Vince Collins (Colin Firth), for a time the most popular entertainers in the U.S. At the end of a vastly successful telethon in the 50s, a young blonde woman turns up dead in their hotel suite. Although both men have solid alibis and thus are never charged with the murder, their partnership is over. Fifteen years later, a beautiful young journalist, Karen (Alison Lohman), sets out to write a tell-all book and discover the truth of what really happened. But how far will she go to get the story, and what are the real reasons behind her zeal?

Where the Truth Lies could have been a true winner along the lines of L.A. Confidential: it has a good cast, an interesting plot idea, and voyeuristic behind-the-scenes glimpses at old Hollywood. However, the film just doesn’t click. The story is a little too confusing for its own good, the atmosphere is too bleak, and some of Karen’s actions just don’t seem believable. The film got a lot of press (although not a lot of screenings) in the U.S. because it was slapped with a box-office-killing NC-17 rating due to some explicit sex scenes, but I didn’t think the scenes were worth all the fuss made over them. While Bacon and Firth do as good a job as can be expected in their roles, and Lohman’s 70s wardrobe is definitely fab, overall, by the time you find out the truth about Where the Truth Lies, you really don’t care.

(Shelly S) Opening February 2, 2006

A divorced father (Tim Robbins), overwhelmed with work, steps out to finish work at the office, leaving his two sons and daughter at home. During this time, sibling rivalry seems to be a constant theme between Danny (Jonah Bobo) and Walter (Josh Hutcherson). Since the two have such different personalities, they have difficulty managing to do anything together as a team. The youngest finds an old game in the basement, Zathura, and finally talks his brother into playing it. This is not any ordinary game but one where the house actually travels in space, and the game must be played to the end in order to return home in one piece. For the two brothers who don’t get along, this is quite a difficult accomplishment. They are confronted with aliens, meteors and many other obstacles. Even their older sister can not help them.

The kids did a great job acting, and the space atmosphere seems realistic and suspenseful. What is missing in this film is the quiet introspective moments and interest in science and space itself. This film misses its chance to catch children’s interest in science and cops out for the cheap video game thrill that naturally captures their attention. We even received a computer game to take home. As a mother, I was disappointed because I would like to see kids inspired to be scientists rather than to spend their time playing computer games and Gameboys. By director Jon Favreau.

(Rita PS) Opening February 9, 2006

This is a delightful and sunny comedy about the nature of love. Set in an idealized 18th century Venice, we are privy to the wooing of Francesca Bruni (Sienna Miller) by none other than Giacomo Casanova (Heath Ledger) himself. This courtship takes the form of the taming of the shrew in that we have a beautiful, intelligent woman being wooed by the greatest lover of all time, who finds himself at a loss as to how to win the heart of a woman who can read his game. It is wonderfully entertaining if a bit cliché – the world’s greatest lover undone by true love. Sienna plays Francesca Bruni very well. She shows us how difficult it is to be a feminist and a hopeless romantic at heart. Jeremy Irons makes a deliciously malevolent papal envoy, and Oliver Platt and Lena Olin are excellent as Sienna’s port lard tycoon Genoese fiancé and her lovely widowed mother, Mme. Bruni, who is trying to save her status by forcing Francesca to marry the lard king. The settings and costumes are elaborate and luscious. A frothy light gilds everything with a levity rarely seen in Venice. I have never seen Venice so clean, figuratively and literally. Gone is the usual venality attributed to Venetians, the havoc wrecked by the Inquisition or the filth of a dirty Grand Canale. In the end, the numerous love stories intersect to give us a reason to flee Venice seconds before the Cardinal charged with Casanova’s arrest arrives. A wonderful film, pure entertainment. Like velvet for the mind.

(Adele R) Opening February 9, 2006

North Country is a fictionalized version of a true story based on the book Class Action by Clara Bingham and Laura Leedy Gansler. The real heroine was Lois Jensen who, in 1984, courageously and tenaciously spearheaded the first sexual harassment suit in a class action against a Minnesota iron mining corporation. It took 20 years, but the women won their case.

The men of the mine, including management, reacted with incoherent rage at the equal rights ruling which forced the company to hire women as miners and were determined to drive them from the jobs which they saw as an exclusive male domain. The film vividly illustrates the brutal hazing, physical and verbal violence, pornographic and scatological graffiti (including excrement smeared on the walls of the women’s dressing room), threats, groping and rape to which the first women miners in the north Minnesota company were subject. The women, who were fearful of losing their jobs and helpless against the united male front, endured silently until Lois Jensen took a stand.

The film does not depict Jensen’s personal history, although she was a single mother who took the job as a miner because it was the only one she could find which would pay enough support her and her children in their own home. And she did suffer, along with her comrades, the abuse depicted in the film. Possibly to make the fictional part of the film clear, Charlize Theron is called Josey Aimes and her fictional story includes Josey’s father, the excellent Richard Jenkins, as one of the miners most violently opposed to the women. Most important to the film is Josey’s friend and champion, Glory, played by Frances McDormand in a tour-de-force portrayal which deservedly brought her the Academy’s nomination for best supporting actress, if not her second Oscar.

It is a gripping, well-directed, film which will leave you cheering. Only Theron is a difficult buy, possibly because the role is tailored to her talents in ways that really stretch credibility and because it seems highly unlikely that someone who looks like that would be a miner! But the story itself is fascinating and McDormand is a must-see.

(Tracy M) Opening February 9, 2006

What do wild chickens and pygmies have in common? A clubhouse, a cool teacher, an armed and dangerous grandma and farm animals in this funny, young romantic adventure based on the pre-teen books Die Wilden Hühner by Cornelia Funke. Director Vivian Naefe and screenplay writers Güzin Heuser and Uschi Reich have made a film that the pre-teen girl crowd can really relate to.

Sprotte (Michelle von Treuberg) is the leader of a cool fifth-grade, all-girl gang, The Wild Chicks. She and her best friends Melanie, Trude, Frieda and Wilma wage a small schoolyard war with the Pygmies – Fred, Torte, Steve and Willi – their rival fifth-grade all-boy gang.

Life and school go on as usual for the Wild Chicks until Sprotte's grandma has the audacity to slaughter some of her older hens to fill her freezer for the winter. Sprotte and the other girls form a plan to save their namesakes who have become mascots for the gang. Unfortunately for them, they aren't very successful and realize that in order to save the hens, they need to have help. Hmmmm, whom to turn to? Luckily for them, the Pygmies are willing to set their differences aside to help the Wild Chicks. Of course, their decision is made a lot easier due to the fact that the adventure takes place at night and the risk of being shot at by Oma Slättberg (Doris Shade) is high.

If you think that the story is over with the hen's successful rescue, then you will be surprised that although this pre-teen adventure seems destined to wind down with a typically dry child-safe ending, it evolves further with a family drama, the loss of a club treehouse and romance between members of the Wild Chicks and the Pygmy gangs.

Both my daughters, Becka (10) and Ally (6 1/2), loved this film. They liked the adventure of saving the hens, the idea that both gangs had a clubhouse where they could go without their parents and yes, the romance – there is even a kiss! Both girls chose characters they would like to be if they could trade places: Ally would be Frieda (Paula Rieman, daughter of German actress Katja Rieman), who has curly hair and wears cool clothes, and Becka would be Sprotte, emotional and desperate for action.

Die Wilden Hühner is not your typical Pixar/Disney fare with more jokes and word-plays for adults than for kids, but an almost true to life adventure that older girls and boys (and their parents!) will enjoy.

(Alyssa C) Opening February 16, 2006

In a world where the plots of even great films are often recycled ones, it is refreshing to know that the imaginations of some movie-makers are still firing on all cylinders. Such is the case in the newest sci-fi flick Aeon Flux, which proves to be a 90 minute adventure in creativity and originality. Based on an MTV animated series created by Peter Chung, every element from set to story and from costumes to characters seems to be new, appropriate for a film set 400 years in the future.

Academy Award winning actress Charlize Theron showcases her flexibility – both physical and theatrical – in the title role as Aeon Flux. An extraordinary talent, her character is no typical heroine either. Under the direction of Karyn Kusama (Girlfight), Theron portrays a badass freedom fighter with an incredible sensuality and woman’s intuition. In spite of the downright awful dialogue, one can see real depth in the character.

In fact, the story itself has more depth than expected. Even after the distinction between the "good guys” and the “bad guys” becomes clear, a moral question remains among the good guys, and it is a very relevant question even in the present time.

In short, Flux hardly deserves the bad reviews it earned for its U.S. opening. At worst it is a nevertheless enjoyable experience to watch Theron, an ex-ballerina who trained for this role with a Cirque du Soleil acrobat, performing dazzling martial arts sequences wearing costumes even sexier than Catwoman’s. At best it is a suspenseful thriller with just enough food for thought that a viewer’s brain won’t go hungry.

(Becky T) Opening February 16, 2006

Yuri (Nicolas Cage) and Vitali (Jared Leto) Orlov, the children of Ukrainian emigrants, grow up in Brighton Beach Brooklyn, New York, also called Little Odessa. In the 1980s Yuri chooses to sell weapons like some people decide to drive a taxi or sell ice cream. He deals indiscriminately in Africa, Lebanon, Monrovia, Sierra Leona, Libya, the Czech Republic, anywhere there is a conflict. He sells to warlords, who, when they become richer, flashier and more evil, are then called lords of war. Yuri has all the trappings of wealth: the Manhattan apartment, trophy wife and small son, so that we probably should define him as a runner of guns, instead of a mere gun runner. There are a few stumbling blocks along the way. CIA agent Jack Valentine (Ethan Hawke) is a pest, buzzing around inopportunely to arrest him. Brother Vitali is too good for the world of death, prostitutes and poverty which come with the business; he becomes addicted to cocaine and bites the dust, literally.

Lord of War is a bad film for several reasons. For example, every line is a cliché. “You have to eat; you have to kill.” “I don’t believe in fate.” “Be careful Yuri, those things you sell kill.” “There is nothing more expensive than peace for a gun runner.” “I don’t care if it is legal; it’s wrong.” “Where there’s a will, there’s a weapon.” “There are two tragedies: getting what you want and not getting it.” “Never go to war, especially with yourself. “

If you had time, like I did, to copy all that during a film showing, there must be very little action.

Also, Nicolas Cage seems to be going the way of Kevin Costner and Richard Gere, i.e., staring in flops. Think: The Weather Man. True, here director Andrew Niccol didn’t give him much to work with, but the terrible script can’t be blamed for Cage’s awkward body language and basset-hound gaze into the camera. Please scratch him behind the ears and throw out a bone, but buy a Kalishnikov or an Israeli machine gun? I doubt it.

The music is too flippant for a serious subject, as if selling the soundtrack is means to an end. The one star is for supporting actor Jared Leto, who provides the only bit of charisma. The film ends with, “The UK, the USA, China, France, and Russia are the biggest gun runners in the world and all are permanent members of the U.N. Security Council.“ Perhaps that’s supposed to be a call to action, but it comes across as a blessing directed at the U.S. gun lobby: if the big guys own and sell guns, then the little guy can, too. Anyone who spends money on this film should be forced to also watch Lost Children about child soldiers in Uganda.

(Shauna K) Opening February 23, 2006

Charles Schine (Clive Owen) is a hard-working, responsible, faithful husband and father until one day he meets by chance Lucinda Harris (Jennifer Aniston) on a daily commuter train to Chicago. He is instantly in lust with Lucinda, who also happens to be married, and he pursues her and shortly after coaxes her into a sleazy hotel for a night of passion. Charles and Lucinda do have quite a night, but in the process get themselves into far more than either had bargained for.

Torn between 3 and ½ stars and four, I wish it were possible to give 3 and ¾ stars. But as the action and intrigue of Derailed had me often perched on the edge of my seat, I’m rounding up to four. Jennifer Aniston might be the biggest name in this film, but Vincent Cassel, cold, evil and fantastic as bad guy La Roche, definitely steals the show. And it is his performance that really makes this film. Despite that though, it is Lucinda’s foreshadowing comment that some people just don’t know how to appreciate what they have that remains foremost in my memory. Big names, lots of action, and a sudden big twist in the plot will ensure Derailed does well at the box office.

(Becky T) Opening February 23, 2006

Flashbacks reveal the childhoods of two half brothers who live separately with different grandmothers. They are fully unaware of each other until, at about age 15, their flighty mother introduces them. As adults, Michael (Christian Ulmen) is an introverted, highly intelligent researcher in the science of cloning, which, he thinks, is a practical substitute for sex. Bruno (Moritz Bleibtreu) is made of studier stuff on the outside, but is vulnerable on the inside and compensates for his love/hate relationship with his mother by seducing many inappropriate women in spite of being married and a father. He suffers breakdowns and lands in hospital wards, and Michael is his only dependable visitor. We suffer with them as they struggle. They bury their dead mother; Bruno visits his alcoholic, penniless father (Uwe Ochsenknecht who mumbles incoherently); Michael returns to England to finish a research project; Bruno checks into a kind of nudist, free-love colony. Both finally settle down with the right women: Michael with rediscovered childhood friend Annabelle (Franke Potente) and Bruno with Christiane (Martina Gedeck), a dominatrix who takes him to group sex parties. Things are looking up, but not before there is a hospital death scene worthy of Love Story or Million Dollar Baby.

German director Oskar Roehler’s grandparents supposedly also raised him, which is perhaps one reason he was drawn to film the best-selling book by Frenchman Michel Houellebecq. Roehler has a history of filming family interaction: for example, Agnes and His Brothers (in this case, three unlike brothers), Der Alte Affe Angst, and Die Unberührbare. This film offers a good chance to see top German actors at their best, especially notable: Ulmen, Gedeck, and Tom Schilling as young Michael, not to forget Bleibtreu who won the best actor award for this role at the 2006 Berlinale. The colors and the photography are beautiful. But, once again, mom is to blame that the boys are a mess. And why does this most European of films have a soundtrack with a collection of English pop songs (although it was fun to hear American Pie again)? Michael says, “The truth is like an elementary particle, split to its lowest denominator.” Perhaps you can find symbolic meaning in the title (which translates as The Elementary Particles); otherwise, just enjoy the film as an overly long, well-made German movie.

(Becky T) Opening February 23, 2006

In this road movie, twelve members of the Rodante family from grandma to the baby squeeze into a trailer to travel to a wedding 1200 miles away. Although they are not gypsies, they live the gypsy life, camping along the way (although they try to stay in hotels at night), swimming in the sea, and repairing their vehicle. Except for passing cowboys riding their horses in the water along the beach or a villager willing to sell a motor part, there is little influence from the outside world. All their adventures arise from interaction among the members of the family.

This film reminded me very much of my own family reunion: 22 people in Florida. Contrary to the Rodantes, we only squeezed eight people into a van (not 12), were concerned about helmets for the cyclists and car seats for the children, and nobody got socked in the jaw or fell in love with a cousin or in-law or adopted a stray dog. At the same time, there were many similarities. We cooked together, worried about leaving that child to cry all by herself, wondered what our brother saw in that woman, cared for the turtles on the beach at night and “did it all for grandma.”

Second Opinion by Coppelia HB

The role of the grandmother, Emilia (Graciana Chironi), is played by the real 84-year-old grandmother of the director. Her acting was great considering she is a non-professional actress. This family trip, incorporating four generations traveling in a motor home from Buenos Aires to Misiones, seems endless at times. It appears more of a home movie than an actual film. Stretches of rolling scenery are interspersed with family interactions oscillating from teenage romance to middle age doubts and regrets amongst the heat and closeness of a small confined space. Although the film could remind some of personal family reunions, there is not a hook to captivate the attention at large. What is amazing is that they "did it all for grandma."

(Becky T) Opening February 23, 2006

First, be aware that this is not the same film as Yours, Mine & Ours. Me and You and Everyone We Know stars newcomer Miranda July, who also directed and wrote the screenplay. It could be called a typical festival film, and indeed it has made the rounds very successfully, picking up the Sundance festival’s special jury prize for originality of vision, as well as four prizes in Cannes including Golden Camera and Prix Regards Jeune. It has received best first film and audience prizes in New York City, Dallas, San Francisco, Stockholm, Los Angeles, and Newport.

The story revolves around Richard Swersey (John Hawkes) and Christine Jesperson (Miranda July). He is a shoe salesman, recently separated, and father of two sons. She is an unconventional artist who supports herself by transporting senior citizens. Both represent the film’s central themes of loneliness, desire for companionship and inability to achieve it satisfactorily. Several minor characters are even more interesting than these two, e.g., the two sons: 14-year old Peter who offers to be the guinea pig for two love-sick teenagers and his six-year old brother Robby who has started an affair on the internet with a stranger. The teenagers act like crazy girls their age and the senior citizens also have their problems of overcoming isolation. This is a film for young professionals who might identify with the main characters, people who like such films as Before Sunset (not I).

(Rita PS) Opening February 23, 2006

If you believe in absolute reality, this film is not for you. Four people are laughing in a car crossing the Brooklyn Bridge. A tire blows out. Three people die. One survives if only for a while. Two good Samaritans try to help. One is Sam (Ewan McGregor), a high-end psychiatrist, and the other is Lila (Naomi Watts), an art history professor. Sam inherits a patient named Henry (Ryan Gosling) from another doctor who has disappeared. Henry is one of Lila’s art students. For Henry, like some arty college undergraduates, death is mesmerizing. Sam wants to help Henry.

From Dr. Caligari to Memento, many directors have asked “what is reality? sanity?” Stay is about straddling the boundary between reality and illusion, life and death, time and space. The cinematography is flawless – images recur, dilute and tease. The film is luminous but ominous, like shiny ripples in an unlit pond. Shots are swathed in golden, red, or blue/green light and represent alternative realities. Director Marc Forster (Monster’s Ball, Finding Neverland) has filmed a multi-layered screenplay by David Benioff (25th Hour) without sacrificing the ambiguity central to the story. Hypnotically visual, this film is also a tribute to some New York architecture: the AT&T Company Building, the Cherokee, the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, the new library at Columbia University and the Brooklyn Bridge. Stay is a thriller of the first order, with a European sense of timing, an A-List cast and an excellent director. “Seeing” is in the eye of the beholder.

(Adele R) Opening February 23, 2006

Syriana is a chaotic movie about the chaotic world of the Middle East. It is about the Texas oil business, about corruption, greed, fanaticism, idealism, collusion and the people caught in the maelstrom. Oh, and murder, torture, lies and deals also play their parts.

This is not a movie for people who long for a linear story line. As in his first movie, Traffic (for which he wrote the screenplay), director and writer Stephen Gaghan has four storylines going at once. It takes concentration to follow the threads, and I suggest that you see this film only in your native language because the confusion is increased by the multitude of languages – Arabic, Farsi, Pashto, and more – for which the subtitles gallop swiftly by on the bottom of the screen.

Confusing or not, it is a very good movie. George Clooney portrays a worn, cynical CIA agent. (He gained thirty pounds for the role, which I guess qualifies him these days for the Oscar nomination, but, although he does a good job as Bob Barnes, I don’t see this as an Oscar-worthy performance). Matt Damon is a young energy analyst, Bryan Woodman, a rising star at a company filled with young European hot shots, and Amanda Peet is his wife, Julie. Christopher Plummer, William Hurt, Chris Cooper, and Jeffrey Wright, all excellent, play pivotal roles. Gaghan based the film loosely on Bob Baer’s book – the CIA operative’s tell-all memoir See No Evil. The oil companies, law firms and the countries involved are fictitious or unidentified, but the accusations levelled not only at the U.S. Government and Justice department, but at all the powers-that-be in that part of the world, including the emirs and those who recruit and train suicide bombers, are merciless and stunning. Gaghan is very even-handed – no one comes off looking really clean, except perhaps the idealistic Prince Nasir (beautifully played by Alexander Siddig) whose obvious intelligence and superior Western education have evidently not prepared him to deal with the erratic, malevolent forces of his world.

The movie is a suspenseful, geopolitical thriller and a fascinating education for a naïve, protected Westerner like me.