Green Book: Book the performances

In my continuing saga to see "Christmas movies," we saw Green Book this weekend.

Let me say this: if this is the Best Picture, then it wasn't a great year.

It's good.  Maybe very good.

But it's not "best."

If you missed the gist of the story, it's Driving Miss Daisy, except the twist is the driver is the white one.  And I guess Mahershala Ali isn't "miss."  But you get the idea.

Car, driver, drivee: two worlds.  They interact.  Come to know each other and, Lo and Behold! become friends.

I'm not sure there's a real twist here. Because it's based on a true story?  Nah.

Viggo Mortensen is good as Tony "Lip" -- a New York bouncer who has enough reputation as a driver, bouncer, etc, to be recommended for a two-month trip with Ali's Doctor Shirley, a jazz trio pianist of some fame who is doing a circuit through the South. This is 1962.

Ali is good, too.  Where Mortensen doesn't have to get far from the early 60s working class New York Italian stereotype, Ali is both a cultured African-American (there's a shot of them stuck on the road opposite African-Americans in a field -- we might think it's cotton), a man with some money, but still the color of his skin in the South means, in the one example, he can't eat in the very restaurant where he is the headliner to play that night. 

They do a good job of interacting; it's good to see Tony do his job well and to develop, and it's good to see Doc gets his fingers dirty with KFC and ripping up some dance music in an impromptu session in a club.

It's worth seeing.  Does it do anything in terms of story, in terms of camera work, in terms of anything that gets outside the box?  No.  But it's a good, solid story.  See it.

Why Did Mary Poppins Bother Return? or, the things we do for Love

[This is the third in a series this week covering movies seen in the last month during the holiday. Enjoy!]

 As even the most incidental Reader of this blog will know,  it would not be my preference to go see Mary Poppins Returns. However, as the subtitle indicates, we do things for love that we wouldn’t do otherwise. My wife was a fan, okay a big fan, of the 1964 Julie Andrews Mary Poppins and when the previews started leaking out– It seems 18 months ago–for this version she was all about it.:-(

So we went. Me under duress.

I dozed through some of it.:-)

Remember the context here: I’m coming off a TBI. One of the things to be careful about in my situation is ”too much input”. Mary Poppins Returns was just too much input.:-(

It’s very colorful. It has lots of music. It is either a wonderful eyeful, or, if you have a brain injury, a pain.

I’m not a fan of the form –my father asked of it ”where in the world people stop in the middle of their day and start singing?”–so it is hard for me to evaluate its elements.

But let me start with this: none of the actors in this version can saying like Julie Andrews. This may not be a real damning statement, but it lets you know that the singing isn’t really the thing here. Probably the worst of the lot is Ben Whishaw, who talks through his songs more than sings. Maybe thankfully.

Lin Manuel Miranda comes up short too; although he’s known for his work in Hamilton. My daughter says he is the weakest voice on the original cast record and he doesn’t change that reputation here.

Next, I did not think any of the songs were memorable. No “Let’s go fly a kite ,” no “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious,” no “Let’s have a wonderful time with Mary” – just a bunch of innocuous tunes moving us from scene to scene.

If you didn’t get this the movie is visually rather stunning. It uses a lot of primary colors, including with the balloons in the final silly scene, and the costumes are well done in an over-the-top kind of way for the 1930s in London and quite colorful.

Should you go see it? If the original meant a lot to you, or you just like musicals, sure. If you’re a curmudgeon like me, shoot yourself first.

One final note, and I know this is overdoing it, but in the last two decades+ I have spent a lot of time in London– sometimes a month at a time. So I think I know my way around the city. I don’t think anybody involved with the movie does: Time and again I think I know approximately where they are in the city and they jump on a bike or trot by foot and end up in the part of the city they couldn’t have done to that way from there. I know this is pedantic, but WTF?! They can’t get THAT right?!

On that curmudgeonly note, I sign off until there’s another movie, or another game or postseason to comment upon.

*The Favourite* is my Favorite

[This is the second in a series of three movie reviews to catch up on those that I saw over Christmas break while on the IR are due to my brain injury. Hope to have the third in the series out as soon as tomorrow, maybe?–this one (gag)on Mary Poppins Returns]

Since I’m told context is important, it is worth telling, I guess, that to see The Favourite we had to go a little more than an hour away to a theater that shows ”art house films.” This theater not only shows art house films but it has those big comfy chairs like barcalounger’sJ. However, given my physical status, I was unable to drive either way and even have to sleep on the way home -- as I indicated I found that movie viewing & going Is hard work.):

But it was worth it. I can’t actually catalog everything I saw this year, but I’m not sure if The Favourite isn’t my favorite movie of the year (and yes I agree with the critic I saw on TV who said that may be part of it -- getting to say The Favourite was my favorite J)

We like period movies here and this one is in excellent example of the form. Based loosely on the biography of Lady Marlborough (Sarah Churchill), The Favourite does an excellent job with costumes and cinematography to make you think that it’s really the early 18^th century.

On top of that, three main actors are all excellent. It’s hard to distinguish who you would single out– Rachel Weisz is great as Sarah, Emma Stone is a devilish Abigail and Olivia Colman has a great time being the Queen.

 If you haven’t gotten the gist of the story from the TV ads, Colman plays Queen Anne (1702-14) and Weisz and Stone compete to be her favorite. It is both historical and comical with some bits of it that are hard to believe given the time period (I’ll leave the details as if spoilers).  In all the manipulation among the courtiers, it is not clear whether Weisz’s Sarah or Stone’s Abigail are manipulating Colman’s queen or Colman is using them to get what she wants and needs. This is both the fun and the intellectual challenge that director Yorgos Lanthimos (The Lobster) presents for us.

To finish – very highly recommended.

Review of Widows, or Why Do That and HT & NDR

[Note: I have not posted a movie review since November 18, even though it is the middle of Oscar-bait season. This is because over Thanksgiving weekend I slipped on ice and hit my head, causing a “mild TBI.” BTW the doctor once told me that when medical personnel say mild they mean it happened to someone other than them.:-) since then I have been unable to write reviews or much of anything else of any length, but now am feeling well enough to write “short ones in” for the three movies I’ve seen since the accident. BTW #2 going to the movies is harder on the brain than one might think.:-)]

In our household, we have a movie rule call the Hyser theory, named after an old friend who first postulated it. This rule says there is a negative correlation between the number of ads seen for a movie and the quality of the movie.

The Hyser theory went into effect for Widows.

We went to see it just two weeks after my accident and it was the struggle for me. Some of it even have to do with the accident. J

 I actually heard someone say in reviewing the Oscar-bait movies that this was the one movie they wanted to see. I hope that person wasn’t disappointed.

Because see Widows is a high-concept movie. If you haven’t seen it advertised, it’s about a group of widows who decide to take over their dead spouses’ job which just so happens to be robbery.

Okay, so, let’s get this straight: you act like you don’t know what your spouse does for a living, they die, you find their plans to their next job, call a meeting of the other spouses who died with them, and decide that because you need the money you’re going to play NFL football and and win. WTF thinks this is a good idea?

Okay, they do this. The problem is the whole thing is formulaic: I actually leaned over and said it to my wife more than once ”who saw that coming?”

And then there’s what I’m about to call the “Not-Dbrolaw Rule (NDR).”  Someone in the movie has to be likable. The only person who comes close in this movie is the number 4 woman in the gang, played by Patrese McClain. I’m going to ignore the fact that she handles a gun and robs and maybe shoots people because we like her story and ‘tude.

We really don’t like Violet Davis’s character, who becomes a nasty-ass criminal, which may be the female empowerment equivalent because her husband, played by Liam Neeson, is a nasty-ass criminal. Don’t mind seeing him dead. Colin Ferrell’s character is  supposed to garner some sympathy, but no he’s a nasty-ass politician, though he seems to not like doing what he’s doing.

 In the end, the movie is not as good as the sum of its parts. With Steve McQueen at the helm and Davis in the lead, you would expect to have a better movie than this.   This will go down as the shining glory neither one of them.

Not really recommended (I’m going to start doing this)

NB in the next few days I will be posting reviews for The Favourite and Mary Poppins Return, which I’ve seen over the Christmas holiday.  Keep an eye out, k?