Engagement

When I heard people say
"I love them more every day"
I thought it hyperbolic
or even outright fabrication
but after years I discover
a truth more poignant than fiction
love is not a line
straight, uniform and rigid
but a flowing, blooming, looping thing
that crests and ebbs
but always grows
and from time to time wonder
like a flash of lightening
reveals a previously uncharted
reservoir of feeling
and these revelations compound
each one upon the last
and I realize, yes
I love you more every day
and that is not platitude or flattery
but bone-deep and resonate certainty.

Boundless Content

The problem with streaming
are it's two greatest assets-
convenience and limitlessness-
the intent is not to entertain,
excite, or enthrall
but to maintain
that thin layer of feeling
that resides just above boredom
in perpetuity.

The question is never why
but why not
as episodes automatically play
one after another after another
inevitable, like gravity
subsuming hours
in unintended lethargy.

But we are, as yet,
still in control of the box
and the outside is still just outside.
Ambition and inspiration not dead
but perhaps more elusive.

'Avengers: Endgame' A Review

Avengers: Endgame is the latest installment of the MCU, the culmination of a decade long loosely-connected series, and part two of last year's innately unsatisfying Avengers: Infinity War. The film opens shortly after Thanos wiped out 50% of all living things with his snap. The Avengers quickly reassemble and immediately try to retake the stones but are unsuccessful. Time passes and a new opportunity presents itself for bringing back those who vanished.

The franchise has amassed some incredible talent over the past decade and they are all displayed here but only a few, mostly due to time and narrative restriction, are able to really shine. The three big tent-pole Avengers- Iron Man/Robert Downey Jr., Captain American/Chris Evans, and Thor/Chris Hemsworth- are given the most time and give the most interesting performances. Downey, is magnetic and effortless, and this is the culmination of a really compelling journey for the character that he nails and clearly relishes. Evans similarly has gone through a pretty substantial arc and is equally comfortable but no less layered. Hemsworth though gives the most dynamic and interesting performance, perhaps because his character is still transforming, this is not an ending for him it is the beginning of another adventure. This makes sense given the Thor character really only came into it's own in Thor: Ragnarok. Jeremy Renner and Mark Ruffalo are more sidelined but have a few decent moments, for them also this is not an ending. Scarlett Johansson is the only original Avenger whose arch is someone underdeveloped and unsatisfying. Outside of the OG Avengers there are appearances from virtually every major character from the franchise and a couple fun cameos but to describe them would be to spoil them. The one major surprise was the sizable role played by Nebula/Karen Gillan who gets a significant slice of screen time and really capitalizes on it.

Visually the film is engaging and fun, outside the inevitable large-scale CGI battle, the aesthetic is much more intimate and provocative than is typical for the MCU. The narrative is a series of pay off after pay off and has a really effective streak of humor. It is effective not because of its action but because of the series of intimate emotional moments that unfold.

A fun, thrilling ride, that absolutely does not stand on its own nor outside of the sprawling franchise that its in. An incredibly satisfying film that makes up for the wait but not quite for the handful of mediocre or plot shuffling installments that came before it.

See It.

'Amazing Grace' A Review

Amazing Grace is a concert documentary about The Queen of Soul Aretha Franklin's 1972 live album of the same name. Filmed originally by Sydney Pollack but left unfinished for years, Alan Elliott has stitched together what is more a rough historical document rather than an actual piece of cinema.

The movie is essentially just the concert, truncated, with little to know talking or context other than the intro given to the audience by James Cleveland one of the musicians and defacto MC. There are a couple odd to disconcerting elements about the movie first is that Franklin herself sued to keep it unreleased. Second is Cleveland's role and behavior in the concert. He runs, dictates, and narrates Aretha's concert. It's unclear why and although he is talented and it's clear the two have some connection watching it play out onscreen comes across as overbearing and strange. Conversely Aretha barely speaks at all.

The music, of course, is incredible but you'd have to be a gospel fan or a big Aretha fan for it to really hold your attention as a movie. There is so little footage and it is so in-artfully shot there is no visual aesthetic beyond the spartan. The sound mix is only marginally functional and for a concert doc that's an issue. All taken together the question of why make and release this movie at all when the album on which its based is readily available doesn't have a clear answer. It's an interesting curiosity rather than film.

Stream It.

I Miss Smoking

Despite the specter
of various cancers.

Despite the regimented
ostracization by institutions.

Despite the silent
judgement of non-smokers.

I miss the burn, the heat
the companionable comfort
of a pack in my pocket
and a lighter in my hand.

I vape now.
Cool.

'Little' A Review

Little is a comedy about successful but authoritarian tech company owner Jordan(Regina Hall) who is transformed into her 13 year old self (played by Marsai Martin) as a result of her bad behavior. She must rely on her beleaguered and previously ridiculed assistant April(Issa Rae) in order to navigate her new circumstances, and maybe learn something.

Hall as always is a dynamo and clearly enjoys her turn as the self-centered heel at the start and Martin remarkably proficient and poised for a younger performer, together create a surprisingly fluid if emotionally lop-sided performance. This no fault of their own as both the predictable transformation the character goes through happens rapidly in the last ten minutes. As does Rae's mousy April, Rae is always captivating but it isn't particularly enjoyable to watch her play such a tentative semi-loser and the moments she really brightens up and lets it loose are few and far between. Her character development similarly comes truncated in the final moments of the movie. Not the fault of the performers, all are pretty stellar and give their all, but with the script and it's pacing.

The costuming is wonderful, colorful, stylish, and really enhances the playfulness of the story. Unfortunately the other design elements are more functional rather than inspired. But it's the story itself that really under-delivers. The formula is a playful inversion of 1988's Big and as a conciet has significant potential. Unfortunately the the emotional journeys of Jordan and April are totally back loaded, this magical bizarre event seemingly do not change them in the slightest until the very end in a very convenient, truncated, saccharine finish. The story basically meanders to the transformation and meanders through 13 year old Jordan being pretty awful and learning nothing and April being meek for so long by the time they change it's almost too late. And at an almost two hour run time the pacing feels almost glacial.

A wonderful idea and a stellar cast fails to excel because of a poor undisciplined script.

Stream It.

'High Life' A Review

High Life is a scifi movie written and directed by Claire Denis. The film opens on a baby crying in an otherwise deserted ship. The baby's father Monte(Robert Pattinson) is then shown cooing through the radio from outside the ship while making repairs. The film then cuts back and forth from when the ship was populated and the various crew member's eventual deaths and the "present" with Monte and the child Willow getting older.

Pattinson continues his trajectory further into bizarre/challenging indie territory and he's good at it but some of the material he chooses is somewhat half baked, this proceeded by Damsel and Good Time the previous to years are equally ill conceived. He's not bad, in fact he's very good, nuanced and compelling and present but the scripts are small budget fringe productions for a reason, the synopses function better than the finished product. Juliette Binoche as the ship's (evil?) doctor is absolutely captivating, as she always is, but it just makes you wish she had a script to actually do something with. The rest of the cast are given so little to do their inclusion is a distraction, although it is always a pleasure to André Benjamin he is clearly wasted here.

Visually the film has a lowfi scruffyness that work well with some deliberate expectations about "space" that are subverted in an interesting way. But ultimately that doesn't particularly matter because the script is so convoluted, under developed, and concerned with it's own false profundity that it's actually a boring incoherent trudge. The story has so many disparate and fractured ideas going on- fertility, criminality, imprisonment, parenthood, the power/perversity of sexuality, isolation, bodily fluids etc.- none of them are ever developed or explored or even particularly acknowledged in a way that makes any kind of narrative or emotional sense. There are some striking moments and scenes but for all it's ambition the film carries virtually no dramatic weight and holds very little attention because of it's lack of focus, context, and clarity.

Similar to the significantly more frustrating Under The Skin the creatives behind High Life ask the audience to do more of the storytelling work than they should. Too much is left to the pretentious and lazy directive of "individual interpretation" when what the script really needed was a good revision.

Don't See It.

Right Sized

In rehab life was small, simple-
meals, meditations, meetings, meds,
workouts, bedtimes, downtimes, visitations-
all segmented and scheduled
after years of boundless chaos and destruction
we had to shrink our scope of living
to rest some order from the grasp of our addictions
at first I found the confines maddening
my lack of freedom unjust and rancorous
but slowly piece by piece healthy habits-
punctuality, cleanliness, civility-
built toward a shaky confidence
and upon release I could continue
perhaps not with assurance
but with some measure of alacrity.

Over years my life has expanded
in responsibility and dimension
but I retain that lesson painfully won
through the tangles and the turmoils
the celebrations and successes
life is simple but not easy
and each day requires effort.

'Hellboy' A Review

Hellboy is a reboot of the series originally launched by Guillermo del Toro, all adaptations of the comicbook series of the same name. Hellboy(David Harbour) is a half human/half demon that works with an underground government organization headed by his father the Professor(Ian McShane) to fight the supernatural. A medieval witch Nimue(Milla Jovovich) returns from the semi-grave to attempt world domination, the only one that can stop her is Hellboy!

If we haven't yet become sick of superhero movies we certainly have reached reboot fatigue. The reboot/remake isn't a modern invention, Hollywood has been resurrecting previous properties since its invention however its the time elapsed and the intention behind it that has changed. Increasingly the time between a film and its inevitable reboot is startlingly short, the first two Hellboy films were released in 2004 and 2008, both unique stories, beautifully designed and prolifically available on streaming service for the past decade. The originals haven't faded significantly from the culture consciousness and as such don't necessitate a rerelease. The other factor is the why. Other than its hard R status this Hellboy isn't terribly inspired, its a gory retread without the effective humor, heart, or coherence of its predecessor.

This 2019 incarnation is mildly entertaining but ultimately there is no real purpose, no real direction, no new point of view that's brought to bear. With a unique perspective, a new take, reboots/remakes can really work, adapting to modern tastes, aesthetics, and stories- Dredd, Jumanji, Power Rangers- to name a few. But disproportionately they fall flat - Carrie, The Mummy, Tomb Raider, TMNT, Godzilla, Robocop, the list goes on and there are many more to come.

We can only vote with our dollars so I would recommend not giving this movie any but it can certainly fill a couple empty hours while doing chores.

Stream It.

'The Beach Bum' A Review

The Beach Bum is a stoner comedy about burnout poet Moondog(Matthew McConaughey) bumbling between the Florida Keys and Miami while maintaining a constant level of intoxication and seemingly avoiding any real emotional interactions or any repercussions from his frequently illegal lifestyle.

In the past several years McConaughey has mostly squandered his much deserved career comeback/transformation dubbed the McConaissance with a series of regressive and mediocre roles of which Moondog is the proverbial bottom(essentially an aged grotesque version of Wooderson from Dazed and Confused). McConaughey brings his innate all-right-all-right charm to this role but it is incongruous with the affluent lecherous addict walking-incarnation of misplaced Hemingway sanctification that the character is. The fault though doesn't reside with McConaughey but with the script and direction.

Visually lush and colorful with an infectious if periodically on-the-nose soundtrack the production elements are top notch but the narrative itself is tired and utterly tone-deaf. Perhaps this story would have made an impression on teenagers in the mid-90s but in our current time this feels like some white male hetero undergrad film student obsessed with Catcher In The Rye and Bukowski's graduation project ie immature, pretentious, and ignorantly mono-cultural.

The movie attempts to portray sexuality in some pseudo-progressive bohemian manner that is actually sexist. It's shows drug and alcohol use as abhorrently positive and reinforces the acidic tortured-addict-artist archetype. Moondog is supposedly a poet, the character repeatedly says how good he is as do multiple other characters but the poetry he quotes and the one poem he recites is just 3rd rate Kerouac aping. All this as well as the implicit privilege Moondog is protected by which give all of his "adversity" virtually no stakes make for an astonishingly boring, predictable, and superficial.

Don't See It.

The Big Dark

During day
ghosts
are laughable,
under sun
gods seem
a fantasy,
in the light
monsters
a distant dream
but
come the shadow
come the night
unseen forces
crowd
unknown spaces
the mystic twine
with imagination
and magic
not so remote
a possibility.

'Prospect' A Review

Prospect is a scifi film about a father and daughter who travel to an alien planet in order to mine gems in its poisonous forest. The film opens on Damon(Jay Duplass) and his daughter Cee(Sophie Thatcher) in a ratty pod, part of an orbiting ship, as they prepare for a mining expedition to the hostile world. They encounter scruffy loquacious prospector Ezra(Pedro Pascal) and they must race against adversity and the clock in order to return to the docking ship before it leaves the solar system.

Duplass is sufficient as the drug-addled cold father but, as his credits indicate, he has more of an affinity for behind the camera rather than in front of it. He's not bad but he doesn't particularly distinguish himself even in the severely limited cast. Thatcher is decent as the lead, more a blank audience cipher than a character, but she gives it enough dimension and enough empathy that it works. She certainly seems to have the potential for a more dynamic performance but the script limits the amount of time spent on internal development. Pascal is the clear and present standout. With delicious, almost Shakespearean dialogue, and a rapscallion-with-a-code kind of DNA he clearly relishes the character and brings his significant charm and intelligence to full wattage in this delightful turn. Ezra is the reincarnation of a particular western/scifi archetype but he does it so well and so magnetically it feels fresh.

With a distinctly lo-fi gritty feel and significant western genre influence this fast-paced, bizarre, scifi drama has a lot to offer. Visually imaginative with tight plotting and world building relying more on inference than exposition Prospect is a sure-to-please for genre fans but may prove too nebulous for the mainstream. Released in only a few theaters in LA and NYC this past November the film is now available for rent.

See It.

It's OK, Kinda

In our age
of selfies
and social media
narcissism
is forgivable

to a degree.

'Shazam!" A Review

Shazam! is a superhero film about an orphan boy Billy Batson(Asher Angel) who gets placed in the latest in a long line of foster homes. After standing up to some bullies for his foster brother Freddy(Jack Dylan Grazer) Billy is then summoned by wizard Shazam(Djimon Hounsou) and given his powers which are activated by saying his name. Billy transforms into his superhero self(Zachary Levi) and initially him and Freddy experiment with the identity for social media popularity and financial gain. Dr. Thaddeus Sivana(Mark Strong), spurned by Shazam as a child for being corrupt, confronts the wizard as an adult and allows himself to be possessed by the seven deadly sins in exchange for power. The inevitable confrontation ensues.

Both Angel and Levi as Billy have an earnest wise-cracking charm that engages the heart and keeps things moving and light enough to still be fun. We are engaged in the transformation the character goes through and we still get the fun of the superhero-as-Big concept and the thrill of the action. Strong is solid as always and brings necessary commitment and gravitas, his usual, to a story that could very easily veer into the laughable. The real stars though are the foster parents and siblings of Billys defacto family. Grazer has the biggest part, as fast talking wry nerd, but Cooper Andrews and Marta Milans(the foster parents) and Faithe Herman, Grace Fulton, Ian Chen, and Jovan Armand(the foster siblings) all give Billy and his story a fullness and heart that uplift and augment an already solid piece of entertainment to something actually compelling(especially for the DCEU).

The sound track is solid, the costumes are bold and colorful, and the action is captured with a fantastic realism that is playful and fun. There is no somber, rain soaked, CGI battle that plagues many a superhero film. The action is clearly visible, the production design has a flare for the fantastic even if the cinematography is more pedestrian. It all works together to make a unique and appropriately aged superhero story. A surprise treat.

See It.

'Pet Sematary' A Review

Pet Sematary is a supernatural horror film, a remake of the 1989 film, both adaptations of the 1983 novel by Stephen King. Creed family patriarch/physician Louis(Jason Clarke) moves his family from Boston to small town Ludlow, ME to spend more time with them. As his wife Rachel(Amy Seimetz), son Gage, and daughter Ellie(Jeté Laurence) are settling in Ellie discovers a pet cemetery in their back yard and meets their grizzled neighbor Jud(John Lithgow). When the family cat Church is killed by a truck Jud takes Louis past the pet cemetery to an ancient burial ground. The next day Church reappears, alive but changed.

The small ensemble all put in decent performances with moments of real emotion amongst the thrill and terror. Clarke brings his everyman competence and charm to bear and shades it well with some palpable internal conflict. Seimetz is given less to do but makes the most of her hysterical heights. Lithgow, looking scraggly than he ever has before, gives a grounded and pathetic turn as the well-meaning but ultimately impotent neighbor. Laurence has the most difficult task and does well playing the innocence of youth as well as the deprave darkness of the corrupt.

With rich visuals, a decent if negligible score, and a limited location and narrative scope the film is a tight, bizarre, and pleasing horror flick but doesn't have the time or the finesse to capture both the horror and the human pathos that's found in the original novel.

A serviceable, entertaining, if somewhat uninspired Stephen King adaptation.

Rent It.

Keep Your House In Order

As a child
chores
were an unbearable
burden
which I executed
with the utmost
reluctance
preferring mess
and lethargy
to any shade
of effort
But now
aged and grown
cooking, cleaning,
even that dreaded specter
laundry
provide a monastic pleasure
and I realize
an ordered home
clean wardrobe
and stocked larder
provide an ease
not only within
the domestic confines
but without
the weight of worry
lessened
by responsibility fulfilled.