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No- sp

This Chilean movie was one of 90 foreign films  submitted by various countries as an entry for an Academy Award. It is the first film from Chile to become one of the five  finalist for an Oscar in this category which will be awarded in about one month from the date that this review is being written. This is the second film directed by Pablo Larrain to be entered by Chile for an Academy Award. The other film was Tony Mannero in 2008.  No is a dramatization of a very important event that happened Chile 1988 , about which we would guess most Americans might only have the vaguest notion. That was the plebiscite in which the Chilean people were given the opportunity, because of international pressure put on long term President and dictator Augusto Pinochet, to vote whether they wanted him to continue for another 8 years. Pinochet had been an army general who was part of the coup d’etat that had overthrown the government of Salvadore Allende in 1973 and subsequently ruled the country as an appointed dictator President. His government was known for killing, interning and torturing thousands of Chilean citizens who resisted his rule. Therefore it was a big event when this election, which was under international scrutiny, was scheduled to take place where a yes or no vote would determine whether Pinochet would stay in place. The story line follows Rene Saavedra (Gael Garcia Bernal) who is a skilled advertising executive who becomes one of the masterminds behind the “ No “ campaign. Each side is given 15 minutes per day on television to make its case  and the actual 1980s commercials  from each side which were shown in that  election were used in the film. In fact 1/3 of the movie is actual archival tapes which is weaved into the scripted segments. This probably included some of the brutal street scenes where Pinochet’s thugs and police were roughing up protesters. 1980 cameras were used to shoot the movie to capture the texture of the times. The movie showed  the anxiety, drama and fear of the NO advertising team as they made their decision to emphasize what they thought would be a new day for Chile (with song and dance) as compared to all out attack on the existing government (although they did some of that also). On one hand this was an exciting battle with a dramatic ending but it also highlighted the subtle emotions with which these people struggled. We learned that many of the small but powerful  roles of the characters on both sides of this struggle were played by the actual people who had been part of the No supporters  25 years ago . This gave our movie experience an added touch of authenticity. (2012)

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Win Win sp- The unglamorous struggles of people’s everyday lives can be the making of a good story and a good movie. Writer /Director Thomas McCarthy who seems to specialize in this approach (The Visitor and Station Agent) takes us to small community in New Jersey where Mike (Paul Giamatti )volunteers as the high school wrestling coach of the very anemic wrestling team,  while he works as a lawyer who helps the elderly. Mike is feeling the stress of the economy and asks the court to appoint him as guardian of a  client with some assets as well as early dementia (Burt Young) so he can get the financial commission. He  puts him in an assisted living facility rather than arranging for him to be cared for at home as he promised the court.. The old man’s taciturn grandson Kyle(Alex Shaffer) appears from out of town and moves in with Mike , his wife (Amy Ryan) their two young daughters and attends the high school . Kyle  happens to be a great wrestler and this is exciting for the  high school team, the Coach and his two assistant coaches (Jeff Tambor and Bobby Cannavale). The conflict is complete when Kyle’s young mother(Melanie Lynskey) also blows into town. She  has been  an addict, not a very good mom or daughter but now wants to be involved with her father because she needs the money. There is poignant meaningful interaction between the main characters by which the audience gains insight into their struggles and growth.  As might be expected Giamatti is the glue of the film as the audience feels his pain, understands his choices and wants to see him work through the jam that he has created for himself. Alex Shaffer apparently a true curly blond teenage boy was a Michigan state high school wrestling champ but had absolutely no acting experience when McCarthy cast him as Kyle and put him under his wing. He carried off his role quite well and needless to say the wrestling scenes were very realistic. Veteran producer of this film Michael London who produced Sideways, was guest speaker at our screening along with Melanie  Lynskey. When a screening is accompanied by an army of security guards as this one was, who search you for cell phones and the like which had to be kept out of the theater, one tends to expect a blockbuster of a movie. That was not the case with this film, but it was a character driven movie that showed real people “wrestling” with the conflicts of their lives and trying to make the best of their situations.(2011)

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The Hurt Locker – rm – This movie is not about your typical US soldier in Iraq. It is about a young man who may not yet have been successful in life or in relationships but who finds himself very good at what he is doing in the Army. In this case it is in finding and detonating bombs that are left at the roadside to blow up US vehicles and soldiers, or are hidden in the ground or strapped perhaps to unwilling suicidal bombers. The movie focuses on one such soldier, played by Jeremy Renner, and his small group of comrades. He is smart, courageous but capable of being emotionally affected by what he is doing. If anyone had any doubts that a woman could capture the realism of a raw combat zone, Katherine Bigelow, who brilliantly directed this movie, has certainly shattered any such misconceptions. As the days scheduled to remain in Iraq are counted down for this group of soldiers, the viewer can smell the acrid air, feel the sand and most of all sense the almost continual apprehension. It may be hard to believe that in our voluntary army, some soldiers choose to be in this place but this film will make it hard to forget those that do. (2009)

* * *
Waltz with Bashir – nf – We had never seen an animated documentary before but that is the essence of this movie. It won many film festival awards as well as a Golden Globe for Best Foreign Film and an Academy Award nomination in this category. Israeli Director Ari Folman set out to fill in the gaps in his memory concerning his experience in the Israeli army during the first war in Lebanon in the 1980s. He does this by interviewing soldiers who served with him at that time, some of whom he hasn’t seen in more than twenty years, plus others who went through this experience, whom he recruits by newspaper advertisements. In most cases he uses their recorded voices in the film but his team has a done a brilliant job developing techniques for depicting the story in cartoon animation which is based mostly on scenes recreated in a studio. The result is a realistic dramatic account of what was a very traumatic experience as this 19-year-old man went through the war and witnessed frightening horrible things. This presumably is why he has these memory gaps and why some of the narrators up until now have had difficulty in saying what they had seen. The key event is the massacre at Sabria and Shatila where the Christian Phalangists murdered Palestinian and Lebanese civilians. This group was a Lebanese political faction allied with the Israeli army who are shown stationed on the periphery of this area but voicing objections once they realized what was happening. The more you understand the history and the politics of this time the better you can appreciate the movie. However, the anti war theme is loud and clear and is punctuated by the massacre scene transitioning into actual newsreel footage of the aftermath of this horrific event. (2008)

* * * *
The Messenger – sp – When you have a good script dealing with a storyline of families being informed by two military guys that their loved ones have been killed in action and you bring in top notch actors, you have the formula for a great movie. Co-writer and first time director Oren Moverman who has some background in the Israeli army captured the drama and emotion of death notification of the Iraqi/Afghanistan War. Ben Foster delivers an exquisitely sensitive performance playing Will Montgomery a young battle scarred veteran who is assigned the last 3 months of his military rotation to work stateside with Captain Tony Stone very capably inhabited by Woody Harrelson. The Captain knows the routine for these heart-wrenching visits with family members and has almost insulated himself from his feelings about what he is doing. Pain appears to drip from every pore as we watch them go on their appointed tasks. Samantha Morton is also outstanding in her role as Olivia Pitterson one of the wives who receives the dreaded news. The well-written script allows the story of each character to unfold, as the young sergeant becomes a buddy with the crusty Captain as well as becoming very understanding and close with the young widow. Steve Buscemi is also unforgettable in his role as a dad getting the news about his soldier son. Woody Harrelson was a guest at our screening and revealed that the director did not have the actors rehearse the notifications scenes, which appeared to intensify the spontaneity and rawness of them. This was counterbalanced in our opinion by a few unnecessarily drawn-out scenes where Harrelson and Foster’s characters were establishing their bonding by drinking in a hideaway cabin in the woods with two girls or visiting the sergeant’s old girl friend at her engagement party. Nevertheless we believe this film will stand as one of defining depictions of the war that we are in today. (2009)

* *
The Men Who Stare At Goats – sp – This is a comedy, or more specifically, a farce that is trying to make fun of the US Army for some ventures that they made into exploring the use of new age techniques and the potential of the application of the paranormal for fighting the enemy. The story is loosely based on book by Jon Ronson published in 2004 where he described the ideas of Lieutenant Colonel Jim Channon who served in Vietnam War and in the late 1970s proposed the formation of the First Earth Battalion. He produced a 125-page manual of drawings, graphs, maps, polemical essays and point by point redesigns of every aspect of military life. Movie producer Paul Lister who was the guest at our film course told us that the actual manual was shown in the movie. In that manual it was proposed that rather than using bullets and munitions, a new force would attempt to first win the hearts and minds of the enemy by doing such things as using positive vibrations, carrying “symbolic animals” of peace—such as baby lambs—into hostile countries, greeting people with “sparkly eyes.” There was a bit in the movie where the character played by George Clooney tries to flash his eyes to bring about this effect. The overall storyline is that a recently divorced, unhappy newspaper reporter played by Ewan McGregor goes to Iraq to find a good story and meets

Clooney who tells how he is a former Jedi of the above group and is reactivated for a new mission. You add Kevin Spacey and Jeff Bridges to the mix with this premise and you get some good delivery of comedic situations, which brought about some loud laughs in the movie theater. There are attempts at “remote viewing” walking through walls, killing goats by starring at them etc. They also brought in the idea of giving LSD to people without them knowing it, which the US and the CIA are known to have actually done about 50 years ago. A real film clip shown in the movie of a news report of Iraqi prisoners continually being subjected to bothersome music to break them down to get information. Thus the film seems to also be attempting to satirize recent US actions with prisoners as well as the earlier time when the Earth Battalion was being proposed. Technically speaking, they are also confusing psychological warfare with paranormal or new age warfare. But after all, it is a comedy albeit it somewhat slapstick. In the end the movie goes nowhere. The targets of the satire are nebulous. It was fluffy without any real depth. (2009)