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Inside Llewelyn Davis- nf  This is a story about a fictional folk singer in the 1960s played by Oscar Isaacs. The Coen brothers wrote the screenplay and also directed it. It also features Carey Mulligan, John Goodman, Garrett Hedlund and Justin Timberlake. Think of a Bob Dylan who never became well known. He is obviously talented and believes in his music. We see him playing in clubs in Greenwich Village in Manhattan and struggling to be recognized and get work. He is intense and brooding. He is scarred by the trauma of the death of a former singing partner who jumped off the George Washington Bridge. He frequently crashes on the couches of people who like and believe in him. There is some very fine folk music in the film not only sung by the protagonist but also an outstanding background music track. This flows through most of the movie as we follow Llewelyn hitching long car rides across the country as he seeks gigs to establish himself. This is a very likable character and we believe the audience will be rooting for him as we were. Much of the film was shot in dark clubs or in the evening. We had to think twice to be sure the movie wasn’t in black and white. You might call it Film Noir without the mystery plot. We don’t see fame and fortune at the end, which might make some of us feel sad. But perhaps this movie is really for the young or those who identify with the generation still in their 20s and 30s when you are willing to hold on to your dream even when the “pot of gold” is not in sight.(2013)

 

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The Greatest – sp – Almost immediately after the movie opens you realize that this is a story about the painful grieving of a family. While in this case it is about the kind of grief most people should not have to experience, it touches upon emotions that everyone has either had or knows that that they can have tomorrow. The writer and first time director Shana Feste shared with us that she probably wrote this because her father had such a loss many years ago and only spoke once to her about it. She researched the subject and her own emotions quite well. She was able to get Pierce Brosnan and Susan Sarandon to buy into this project and bring their maturity and great acting to this film. Then Ms. Fester and her duo of women producers Lynette Howell and Beau Marie St. Clair were able to find young Carey Mulligan, before she received her Oscar nomination for An Education, to play the centerpiece of the young woman who carried within her the essence of this film. All three stars brought to the screen a very palpable realism in their three different but yet very appealing characters, each of whom drew you in as you felt their pain. A trio of three young talented actors rounded out the outstanding cast. The movie has the haunting presence of what we recall from the 1980 Oscar winning film Ordinary People which incidentally had the same Director of Photography, John Bailey. Whereas the older classic showed the disintegration of a family, this one leaves you with the possibility of a rebirth. The experience is definitely worth going through (2010)

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An Education – sp – How often does it happen that a promising high school student goes astray and blows the opportunity for a great college education? It could be drugs, alcohol, falling in love or whatever. In this movie set in London in the early 1960s, it is an attractive extremely bright 16-year-old girl (Carey Mulligan) with no apparent drug use but occasional cigarette smoking, who hopes to get into Oxford, study English, speak French and explore the classics. Through a chance meeting with a somewhat older man (Peter Sarsgaard), she becomes enamored with him, his apparent wealth and appreciation of music and all the fine things. Her parents don’t have a clue what is going on and her father (Alfred Molina) concludes this guy is a fine fellow. He would not even object if she decides to skip college and go off into the sunset with this wonderful man. This film adroitly directed by Danish director Lone Scherfig focuses closely on Carey Mulligan, this delightful young women who is in every scene and we clearly see her evolution. The photography of this period piece is well done particularly of the English countryside, the automobiles and the clothes. Things are not always what they seem to be and the movie has a storyline that you may not anticipate. The script is actually based on a true-life situation originally written recently by women now in her 60s. There is also a questionable anti-Semitic theme, which can lead to some interesting post movie discussions. Susan and Michael differed on the final value of this film as Michael also felt that it had some unresolved and unaddressed moral issues. We ultimately went with Susan’s rating as we both thought the movie was worth seeing. (2009)