**

Now You See Me- rm – The opening scene is a great magic trick which you in the movie audience can participate if you pick a card, any card from the deck being shown to you. It is the first 40 seconds of this trailer for the movie- after the commercial . What comes next is a thriller caper with lots of magic. The first trick was people at a gigantic Las Vegas show robbing a bank in Paris . Everything seemed to get more grandiose from there. The screenplay by Ed Solomon and Boaz Yakin and directed by Louis Leterer built one preposterous gimmick after another. The key magicians Jesse Eisneberg, Isla Fischer and Woody Harrelson seemed to be one step ahead of the FBI and Interpol led by Mark Ruffalo and Melanie Laurent. What might have been a great car chase through Manhattan’s highways and bridges was known to anyone from New York as unrealistic as the cops never weave in and out of traffic dangerously risking innocent people’s lives – especially just to catch a potential money thief. Michael Caine of course is always great as some rich guy entwined with tricky magicians seemingly getting away with lots of money. Morgan Freeman is intriguing as usual, this time as the ex-magician who exposes other magicians (perhaps based on the real life “ Randy, the Magician ”). Do we have very clever magicians, an inside job, get rich quick artists or a bunch of robin hoods?? In the end there is a good chance you are not going to care that much. Now that we have seen it, you don’t have to. (2013)

**

Stories We Tell rm– What if you found out that the man you thought was your father was really not your father? This is part of the complicated journey that Sarah Polley experiences as she uncovers the secrets of her family. Being a filmmaker, an Academy Award nominated one (Away From Her) Ms Polley decides to make this documentary film so all characters in her family story can tell their version of the truth. All that is except the central and most interesting player, her mother who has died of cancer when Ms. Polley was still a young girl. Her siblings, other relatives and friends add to the picture that is mainly painted by the two main men in her mother’s life both of whom have been writers/producers/actors, so they express themselves quite vividly. There is something fascinating in seeing hidden family secrets being unearthed and being laid out before us. One of us has explored this very theme in the blog PsychiatryTalk.com and it has remained the most visited entry in the almost four year history of this blog. One of the main ideas highlighted in this film, that a father would still love a child even if he found out  when she was a grown young woman that he did not plant the seed, seems not to be a great revelation. In fact, the interviews and the emerging insights were quite repetitive which should not be surprising when the filmmaker who is a central object of the film had to have directed the editing. However the film was not without it’s redeeming moments, one of which included a foreshadowing movie clip of the mother as a young woman performing the song “Ain’t Misbehaving.” Another memorable snippet was when one of siblings seems to have an epiphany that perhaps the fact that three children became divorced shortly after learning of their mother’s unfaithfulness to their father, might be significant. This movie has to have been cathartic for the filmmaker and some of her family. It may even live on as an example of how to use the in depth interview as a search for the  truth of hidden family secrets. We don’t think it makes the grade as top notch entertainment for the rest of us. (2013)

**

Arthur Newman –sp  Despite excellent performances by Colin Firth and Emily Blunt who play two people trying to find themselves, we didn’t feel this movie moved us to the point where we would recommend it. First time feature film director Dante Ariola  was attracted to the story written by Becky Johnson, of a man who wasn’t there for his son once he himself felt he was a failure in life. He takes Firth’s character, a newly invented Arthur Newman, on a journey as he tries to leave his old life behind. He meets “Mike”(Blunt)  a young woman who is trying to escape from what she feels is inevitable mental illness that is the fate of  her mother and her twin sister. They embark on a kind of road trip where they try to briefly inhabit the lives of people they meet along the way. In the course of experiencing other people’s lives they are supposed to come to terms with their own. British actors Firth and Blunt both speak and act like the all American Ford Thunderbird convertible that they travel in. The photography by Eduard Grau is quite good, There are supporting roles by Ann Heche as the old girl friend and Sterling Beaumon as the son who is struggling to figure out his missing father. The film held our interest but this road trip didn’t take us any place. (2012)

**

Flight- nf  When an actor who is on the screen all the time, holds your attention and clearly shows the problem which his character is suffering, that actor deserves kudos for that performance. In this case it is Denzel Washington who plays Whit Whitaker, an airline pilot who is an alcoholic and cocaine user who on a routine flight finds himself on plane with a mechanical failure. He does an unbelievably tricky maneuver where he flies the  plane upside down to slow it down and make an emergency landing on a open field saving all “souls onboard” except 2  crew and a few passengers. You probably know all this from the coming attractions. Will he be found out to have been drinking or will  he ever admit his alcohol and drug problem which we all know is necessary to get over it?  That is just about the essence of this movie. There is a lot of drinking and some drugs with small supporting roles by John Goodman as your happy, friendly cocaine dealer, Don Cheadle as the lawyer who is supposed to defend Whit and Melissa Leo as the opposing lawyer. There really aren’t any dramatic unpredictable courtroom scenes. There is no fascinating back-story or a plot that got pulled together in a fantastic ending. If anything, the conclusion is one of a few that you would have predicted. It isn’t very believable but I am sure that the star’s name and all the hype that the movie has received will probably make it a box office success. (2012)

**

Lovely, Still  nf– We find it very difficult to discuss this movie without revealing the entire story which we will warn you when we do. We are presented with Robert Malone, an old lonely man (Martin Landau ) who lives alone but still is working everyday in a supermarket. (This Oscar winning veteran actor was about 80 at the time he made the film  but he was made to look on the older side of  his age.) It is Christmas season and we see him place a present under his  tree for himself. Mary, an  equally older woman (Ellen Burstyn) who looks much more attractive for her age moves next door with her daughter (Elizabeth Banks). The moving truck has barely pulled away when she presents herself to his door (actually, she walks in  since it was open) and within a few minutes has asked him out for a “date”  He is smitten  with her and she seemingly with him. He doesn’t know what he should do for a date and his store manager (Adam Scott) arranges a great place to dine and his co-workers give him advice how to act. We got the feeling that the writers Tim Kasher and writer /director Nicholas Facker were giving us their version of  how they imagine older folks would respond when they fall in love. They declare their love for each other after knowing each other for two days  They  go sled riding down a hill together and take a ride through the city streets in a horse drawn carriage. They are shown to be totally preoccupied with each other . They call each other as soon as they wake up and in a few days they are sleeping in the same bed. When they exchanged Christmas presents she accidentally opened the present that he was planning to give himself and it was gun. He tearfully acknowledged he was going to kill himself because he was so lonely , but of course not any more.  All we can say is that despite the skill of these actors it certainly didn’t look real to us ! Spoiler Alert !! Don’t read further if you plan to see this movie which we don’t really recommend. There was a clue. In between scenes there was this spidery, fluffy, stringy material  of a reddish color that would occupy the screen –with “strange music“ in the background when it was shown. There were some confusing incidents where Mary  accidentally spilled her own medicine down the drain and couldn’t get her prescription filled right away because her doctor was out of town (this was to mislead us) We then see her fill her prescription and sneak in and  put it  in Robert’s  medicine cabinet. He never takes the pills but gets to Mary’s house. We see the pictures on the wall are of him as the store owner/manager, his wife and his children. He collapses and goes to the hospital. There it becomes clear that his girl friend is his wife, the present store manager is his son and Mary’s daughter is his daughter. The spidery fluffy stuff must have been the interweaving cells of the brain that were in trouble with this man. We figure that  it must be some weird brain disease (we were never told) where he can’t remember his past but yet his short  term memory is o.k.  We can appreciate that this movie worked for some people and it received some decent reviews. It used this storyline to show a love that had been lost by a ravishing brain  disease was able to be rekindled and experienced as a first love. This is tender, touching and is a wonderful thought. We never heard of such a case  but anything can happen in the movies! ( 2010)

**

Lorax: This is a well publicized  blockbuster movie of  a Dr. Seuss book which was just released on the author’s birthday. It is a high tech computer animated film directed by Chris Renaud and Kyle Balda  starring the  voices of Zac Efron, Taylor Swift , Danny DeVito and Betty White.  When we arrived at our local multiplex with two grandchildren ages 8 & 10 to see this movie, ½ hour before show time  we found that the 5pm show was soldout so we got tickets to the 7:40pm ( this was the regular HD –not the Imax or the 3D. )When we came back 40 minutes before show time we still had to wait on long line that snaked around the mall and had to sit up close and a little to the side. Both kids had read the book recently and knew the story, which was ancient history to us. Us  grown ups found the movie, fair, not at all compelling as we recalled feeling about the Disney classics. The 10 year old agreed but said she didn’t expect more. The eight year old liked it a lot but agreed that  the music wasn’t particularly appealing (It seemed splashy maybe even grungy to us). There were a lot of younger kids in the theatre who clearly didn’t have the slightest idea what was going on story wise but liked it when someone crashed down or perhaps when there was a nice furry animal but it wasn’t really a movie for those younger kids. The lesson of the movie is that one should not  destroy trees. The young hero( who looks like a young kid-he is suppose to be 12,  but rides a motorbike) of the movie leads us to this conclusion although his motivation is because he wants to please his girl friend so she will kiss him and marry him . It is not because he starts off believing trees are good for this earth and in fact it is only his grandmother who even remembers trees. What Dr. Seuss ever lacked in a plot, he always made up with his  wonderful language and poetry. This movie didn’t use his language although it certainly tried to capture the spirit. It probably is going to be a big hit although we would suggest that you and the kids stick to the book. (2012)

**

Being Flynn- sp  Paul Weitz (American Pie) directed and wrote the screenplay of this movie based a real book about real people. Robert DiNero plays Jonathan Flynn a crusty old self proclaimed great writer who left his wife and child at very young age. The mother (Julianne Moore) tried her best to raise her son with two jobs but ultimately couldn’t handle things and ends her own life. The son Nick Flynn (Paul Dano) in trying to find himself, takes a job in a homeless shelter where his dad shows up, down and out, but still spouting how he is about to write the next great novel. The film is a great vehicle for DiNero who captivates the screen and hold the audience with his great character interpretation. Despite this virtuoso performance we couldn’t figure out if this man is a self centered narcissistic character or a man plagued by mental illness demons and the ravages of alcohol. This uncertainty for us made it difficult to understand and empathize with what it was really like Being Flynn. Dano is excellent as the young man who falls into his own depravity during his struggle. His own attempt at resolution only was half the story so in the end we couldn’t raise two thumbs for the movie.  (2012

**

Higher Ground-sp  Vera Farmiga for her directing debut chose a movie in which she also starred and one that had a background with which she apparently was quite familiar. Having grown up in a fundamentalist community herself, she knew exactly what she was doing when she took on the story written by Carolyn Briggs and Tim Metcalf. It shows two generations of a family steeped in a Christian congregation led by Pastor Bill (Norbet Leo Butz) that prayed and sang to Jesus and all seemed happy and content no matter what happened to them. There certainly was lot of singing and praying on screen. Corrine Walker  (Farmiga) is swept along with this unbending faith as she marries her teenage sweetheart (John Hawkes) whose happy religious contentment is even greater than hers. All the lovely children in the family seem angelic as they are brought along in the fold. Being a believer in this community means more than just praying to God and Jesus. It also means that women have s subservient role and even in their declarations of faith that should never even suggest that they are lecturing or teaching the men.  Subtle doubts in Corrine are exacerbated as her friend develops a brain tumor but she obviously tries to keep her faith. When she begins to doubt, she has to encounter what erupts in her husband.  She can understand the faith that others maintain but will she be able to keep her own? Part of any success of an Independent film such as this one is the propensity of the audience to identify with characters in the film. That will be a stretch for many of modern day Americans even those with a religious tilt. In the end, the theme of doubt may not be even palatable with the hardcore religious groups to bring them into the movie theatres for this one.  (2011)

**

Babette’s Feast- nf-  Somebody mentioned to us that we should catch this 1987 Oscar winner for the best foreign that year. While there was a great scene of the preparation of a French meal , this was not a great feast  for us.  Two sisters live in a remote Danish town. They are the daughter of a minister who has captivated the small group of people who live there and follow his religious teachings even  after he has passed on. The sisters Phillippa   (Hanna Stesgaard) and Marina (Viveke Hastrup) each pass up the opportunity to fall in love with a dashing military officer and opera singer respectively and continue to live in their cloistered community.  A persecuted French women comes to live with them as their cook for 14 years until circumstances lead her to prepare them all a wonderful French meal with wine and all the trimmings. The underlying theme is the spirituality or religiosity that allows them to all  hold on to their values and believe they ultimately will be rewarded.  To us it is ultimately a sad commentary on missed opportunities for relationships, love and realizing your full potential as a person. We didn’t find it moving , although the characters were mildly interesting and the acting and direction under Gabriel Axel was top notch. We obviously have missed something here. As we noted it was chosen best foreign film and we usually find that there are some great films made outside the US. (1987)

**

Terri-rm-  Terri (Jacob Wysocki)is a very obese 15 year old who lives with his demented uncle( Creed Bratton)and is bullied inschool. He develops a relationship with the empathic Assistant Principal Fitzgerald (John C. Reilly) who is trying to help him. There are two misfit friends, an attractive blond Heather (Olivia Crocicchia) and Chad (Bridger Zadina). The movie starts off very slowly and frequently drags on. We don’t know very much about the background of the teenagers and view them as your generic troubled high schoolers. Similarly, it is suggested that Mr. Fitzgerald has some problems but we only vaguely know about him. There are a number of potential comedic moments between him and Terri as well as a suggestion of some good chemistry but it never gets to the point where we are moved to laughter or anything close to tears. Reilly is the kind of actor who will grab your attention especially when he is going some place with his character which wasn’t the case here. Wysocki appears to be a talented actor who knows how to convey his feelings with few words. I am sure we are going to see him again in future efforts, hopefully in a more healthy size, and in a better movie . (2011)