The Official Review Thread of 2020

[Sabin]

Startlingly diminishing returns as it goes along. I found On the Rocks very charming for the first half. I've heard it described as a 1930s screwball comedy but without the jokes. Instead, we get naturalistic observations, excellent details, and a lot of atmosphere. This approach is very interesting at first and it winds up feeling truthful, but the downside is there's just nowhere much of interest to go. Generally, I loved everything in the film except the general direction of the story. She doesn't really dig much into the source of her characters' discontent beneath the lightweight plot and so it ends up feeling a bit meaningless. I hope it's not too dismissive to say at this point that Sofia Coppola doesn't have much to say about the world besides "People have problems, people are resilient, everything will be okay." Couched inside a strangers-crossing-in-the-night structure like Lost in Translation and it works. On the Rocks treads a lot of water to get to that conclusion (especially in its third act) but there's a lot to enjoy here and there.

Bill Murray is bound to get the lion's share of praise for this film for good reason. Sofia Coppola gives him the most wonderful things to wear and say. But Rashhida Jones is a strong stand-in for Sofia Coppola/exhausted in-a-rut type. She's a very good actor who projects an intelligence that makes her hard to cast and seems more a natural fit for television comedy than features. It benefits from a baked-in authenticity from a director and lead actress with complicated relationships with larger-than-life fathers of their own.

A scribble but an enjoyable one... for a while. Had I seen it on the big screen, I might be a bit more taken by it.

[Sabin]

There is a scene somewhat early in The Trial of the Chicago 7 directed with so little energy, I couldn't believe it. It's a flashback series from the courtroom to all of the seven defendants asking for permits. It's shocking how little Aaron Sorkin decided to do with this sequence. There's no visual panache. No feel to the room, no atmosphere, nothing to make the viewer feel as through they've been thrusted back in time. There's no music under the sequence to connote a jaunty mood or otherwise to punctuate Sorkin's dialogue or the performances. This sequence should be a charm offensive to get us on their side. I want to be on the Chicago 7's side. But instead, it just felt like I was watching Hollywood dress-up. And then I started thinking if it was possible for another one of Sorkin's collaborators to come up with a more boring way to film this sequence. Certainly, Spielberg wouldn't have. And so it's impossible for me to think of The Trial of the Chicago 7 as much more than hopelessly inferior to the version we should've received in an alternate world where Spielberg directed it.

The best case that I can make for this film is that it's fine. It's an Aaron Sorkin history lesson about something that's inherently compelling so it's going to be inherently compelling. I enjoyed the points of contrast drawn between Hoffman/Hayden, Hoffman/Hoffman. My favorite line was when one of the Seven chimed in "Hard to believe the seven of us couldn't stop the war" amidst an absurdly derailed squabble that dragged in the semantics of Jack and the Beanstalk. But as directed, the central figures nor the moments come into focus or become as large as they should be. As with Molly's Game, I felt like dialogue was front and center, and there's a lot of it. Sasha Baron Cohen's accent is hit or miss and the film shortchanges him every chance it gets through Sorkin's direction. Clearly as a storyteller, Sorkin is not on his side (it's generally a pretty square film). But Cohen is very compelling if not age-appropriate and gives a scary/funny performance that survives the dull direction.

I almost think a miniseries would be better served for the material and Sorkin's logorrheic instincts. There's just no time in a feature for the weight of the essential context to share screen-time with his wit. I don't care if The Social Network wasn't really about Facebook, but I do care if by the end of The Trial of the Chicago 7 you don't really feel like you know any of the people, feel the weight of Vietnam, and find the prosecuting attorney more sympathetic than the defendants. Big disappointment.

[anonymous1980]

THE FORTY YEAR OLD VERSION
Cast: Radha Blank, Peter Kim, Oswin Benjamin, Reed Birney, Jacob Ming-Trent.
Dir: Radha Blank.

This is a semi-autobiographical about an African-American woman who was once a rising young playwright, finds herself almost 40 without a prolific career in the theater and decides to take up hip-hop. I may not be a black woman but this film hits close to home for me since I, too, am a writer who just turned 40 but is still struggling (I mean, I make a comfortable living but advertising and proofreading aren't exactly what I was aiming for). That aside, this is a wonderful debut from writer-director Radha Blank. It's funny, well-written, equal parts Woody Allen and John Cassavetes as filtered through the experience of a woman of color. Despite it being set in the present day, it sometimes feel like an indie film from the '70s, I must say. This is on Netflix and I highly recommend it.

Oscar Prospects: Even in this year, it will probably be a challenge for this to get any traction. I'd like to see Radha Blank get a Musical/Comedy Actress nomination at the Globes though.

Grade: A-

OVER THE MOON
Cast: Cathy Ang, Philippa Soo, Robert G. Chiu, Ken Jeong, John Cho, Sandra Oh, Ruthie Ann Miles, Margaret Cho, Kimiko Glenn (voices).
Dir: Glen Keane.

This is an animated musical about a young girl loses her mother then goes up into a rocket ship to the moon with her future step-brother as a stowaway to meet a mythical Chinese moon goddess. First things first, this is a beautiful, BEAUTIFULLY animated film. The visuals here are imaginative and gorgeous. The film's heart is definitely in the right place. The theme of dealing with grief is made more poignant by the fact that the script is by the late Audrey Wells who died of cancer a couple of years ago so there's that on top of it. It doesn't really quite have the extra "oomph" it needs to really (pun intended) take flight, something that studios like PIXAR and Studio Ghibli have mastered. The songs are okay though none of them stood out. It is still a good movie but it's not going to join the upper-echelons of animated classics anytime soon.

Oscar Prospects: It should get in Animated Feature. Original Song is also possible.

Grade: B

[Big Magilla]

A few words about Netflix marquee Fall offerings, both of which reflect the 1968-1970 period.

The Boys in the Band opened off-Broadway in 1968, and I saw the movie in early summer 1970. I'm not quite sure why a new version was thought to be needed, especially one that so mirrors the original. (I haven't checked into it, but was it shot in the same terraced apartment? It looks identical.)

No. Friedkin's film was famously made in Tammy Grimes' apartment or so it was supposed to be. Unfortunately they couldn't move the cameras around so they built a studio replica of the rooms without walls where they could have easy camera access. They did use her terrace, though, for the terrace scenes. I think the interiors of the new film were done in a studio in L.A. I have no idea whose terrace they used.

There were small changes in dialogue approved by Mart Crowley. The opening montage was different and the flashbacks in the new version were not in the original.

[Mister Tee]

A few words about Netflix marquee Fall offerings, both of which reflect the 1968-1970 period.

The Boys in the Band opened off-Broadway in 1968, and I saw the movie in early summer 1970. I'm not quite sure why a new version was thought to be needed, especially one that so mirrors the original. (I haven't checked into it, but was it shot in the same terraced apartment? It looks identical.) I suppose there might have been some desire to immortalize this fairly high-profile cast, but I can't say they fared all that well against my memories of the original group. I saw the film twice, but even the second time was 48-49 years ago -- yet many of the line readings ring in my head to this day, and I can't say any of them in this new version landed as well. Some may be simply too familiar to zing anymore ("One thing you can say for masturbation..."), but "Sort of makes you want to run out and buy a slide rule" brought down the house in 1970, and barely registers here. Emory needs to be hilarious, and, in the hands of Cliff Gorman, he was, but Robin De Jesus doesn't do a whole lot with him.

I actually found myself noticing how unimportant some of the characters are to the play. Donald, even in the imposing form of Matt Bomer, basically serves as sounding board for Michael's scene-setting, but, apart from his peripheral contact with Larry, might as well not be there the rest of the evening. I always found Bernard a puzzling inclusion -- he seems to be there to make some political point about degrees of prejudice, but doesn't much fit into the plot. The Hank/Larry storyline is one of the stronger ones, but I was surprised here by how weak the Hank character was -- especially compared to the impression Laurence Luckinbill made. I was surprised someone as prominent as Andrew Rannells took on what was always, to me, a subordinate role in the pairing, but he does make a stronger showing here, in context.

I basically always thought the play, in the words of a college professor, "works" -- as we say in the biz, it plays well. But it has nowhere near the organic strength of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, despite similar structure. The whole telephone game can feel a bit mechanical, and in this version, I found myself baffled why Alan would agree to stay and let himself be bullied like that. Or why any of them would agree to play such a venomous/risky game. Answer: because it makes the play go. And we accepted that, at the time, because the play was meantime allowing entry into a world that was, for many of us, quite distant -- the depth of the guided tour made the conventions worthwhile. I'm not sure that holds up as a rationale all these years later, when that world has been largely opened up (and some of the things displayed are seen as either cliches or utterly outdated).

Oh, and what was that extended post-curtain montage? -- it just seemed to make the film go on 2-3 minutes past its climax, to no discernible effect.

Overall, I found this watchable enough, but I feel like, if I watched Friedkin's movie again, I'd like it much more (if probably not as much as I did then).

The Trial of the Chicago 7 covers events beginning that same 1968, and culminates in the verdict reached in winter 1970. I was at Northwestern then -- my freshman year -- and, not surprisingly, I remember some elements differently. William Kuntsler, portrayed here as sort of a good-hearted soul shocked by the abuses he finds in the justice system, was in fact a rabble-rouser not far from Abbie Hoffman territory. He came and spoke on campus during the trial, and provoked his audience into going out and breaking windows all over campus. I also find very hard to believe the lead government prosecutor would be such a naif as to stand in solidarity with the defendants at the climax. On the other hand, the film was, if anything, soft on Judge Hoffman, who was a total troglodyte -- even threatening to hold defendants in contempt for wearing their hair long.

Beyond questioning facts, I just didn't find the film had as much verbal vigor as such Sorkin efforts as Steve Jobs and The Social Network. Some of the Hayden/Hoffman arguments had some juice to them -- and managed to give equal deference to the two men, whose approaches couldn't have been more different -- but a lot of the film seemed more sentimentalized than I'd have expected: nearly everything to do with Joseph Gordon-Levitt's character, and the policewoman/Jerry Rubin relationship. And I thought the ending was a flat disaster -- something Sorkin collaborators like Boyle or Fincher would never have allowed (though Taylor Hackford would have been all in).

The performances are mostly solid. Brace yourself for something you never expected me to say: Eddie Redmayne wasn't bad; he squelches his "love me" instincts and plays Hayden straightforwardly. Despite my problems with the characterization, I thought Rylance did well with Kuntsler. I think John Carroll Lynch, an underrated actor, does a terrific job with Dellinger. And I think Sacha Baron Cohen is a real surprise as Abbie -- he certainly plays up the showboat aspects, but gives a full-bodied performance...beyond what I'd have thought him capable.

I'm not nearly as enthusiastic as some here -- three stars, maybe -- and I didn't feel the sense of missing movies I did after Da 5 Bloods. But worth watching.

[anonymous1980]

REBECCA
Cast: Lily James, Armie Hammer, Kristin Scott-Thomas, Keeley Hawes, Ann Dowd.
Dir: Ben Wheatley.

A young woman marries an heir to a fortune who was recently widowed and the memory of her new husband's dead wife looms over her, the titular Rebecca. When I first heard about this, I thought to myself, "Why?" Hitchcock already made a masterpiece out of the Daphne du Maurier book. So why try? Well, Ben Wheatley is directing and he's been making interesting genre pictures for the past decade. I thought maybe he can make it interesting. Now that I've seen it, still I ask, "Why?" Nearly everything I loved about the Hitchcock version was tossed out of this version. I understand not wanting to do it exactly like Hitchcock but what they substituted it with wasn't very good. It was actually a few minutes shorter but felt longer. The actors were good, the production is handsomely mounted and Clint Mansell's score is gorgeous but the entire thing is pointless. Stick to the 1940 version.

Oscar Prospects: None.

Grade: C-

BORAT SUBSEQUENT MOVIEFILM: DELIVERY OF PRODIGIOUS BRIBE TO AMERICAN REGIME FOR MAKE BENEFIT ONCE GLORIOUS NATION OF KAZAKHSTAN
Cast: Sacha Baron Cohen, Maria Bakalova, Mike Pence, Rudy Giuliani.
Dir: Jason Woliner.

After disgracing the country of Kazakhstan, journalist Borat Sagdiyev is sent back to the U.S. to give his daughter to a powerful American man. It's kind of wild that Sacha Baron Cohen managed to film a sequel to Borat right under our noses...and during a pandemic too! I'd be very interested in finding out how they pulled it off. But how is the film? It's not quite as good as the first one but it's still pretty good. There are lots of genuine laugh out loud moments here. I was also surprised by how sweet and moving the father-daughter relationship narrative that serves as the thread that connects all the gags and pranks turned out to be. No, Rudy Giuliani was definitely not tucking in his shirt.

Oscar Prospects: Makeup & Original Song ("The Wuhan Flu Song") are possible.

Grade: B+

[Big Magilla]

I watched Borat: Subsequent Moviefilm early Friday morning.

I get what he was trying to do, but I agree it wasn't shocking and it does nothing to add to the discredit Trump, Pence, and Giuliani do to themselves on a daily basis. We've all become numb to that.

What I find truly disparaging is the support Trump still gets after all that he has done. If he somehow manages to win another four years nothing in this film will be funny in retrospect. I honestly don't know what people will turn to for entertainment or anything else.

[dws1982]

Borat: Subsequent Moviefilm

A lot like the original one, at least in terms of what works and what doesn't. It works in segments, it's very funny in individual scenes, and the plot, to the extent that there is one, is really just an excuse to put Borat in different situations where he interacts with people (famous and not) and goads them into outrageous and embarrassing things. Like the original film, you can honestly get as much out of it by watching individual scenes as by watching the whole thing. Baron Cohen commits fully to the act, as always, and Maria Bakalova, as Borat's daughter does as well. Unlike Baron Cohen, who has done solid work in other things (like the Chicago 7 movie this year--although I think Mark Rylance is the standout there), I have no idea what else she can do but this is impressive work. The Giuliani sequence is genuinely shocking (and I know there's editing and all of that, but there's no explanation for that from his perspective, in my mind), but overall it's a less funny and less shocking movie than the original. I remember in the original there was a scene in one of Borat's one-on-one interviews with a comedy coach (his one-on-one interviews were always the funniest, in my mind), where he says, "Sometime my sister, she show her vazhïn to my brother Bilo and say 'You will never get this you will never get it la la la la la la.' He behind his cage. He cries, he cries and everybody laughs. She goes 'You never get this.' But one time he break cage and he 'get this' and then we all laugh. High five!" The comedy coach high-fives, laughs, and then you see him have a moment of realization that he's laughed, on camera, at a story about incestuous rape. I've watched that movie since 2006, but I still remember how shocked I was by that scene when I saw the movie in a theater in 2006. And that was a small moment in that movie that was full of similar moments. This movie doesn't really have that, at least not at the level of the original film. It's good. It definitely skewers Trump's America, but from an outsider's perspective that I don't find particularly illuminating. But if you're going to do it from an insider's perspective, Borat is not the character for that.

[anonymous1980]

WOLFWALKERS
Cast: Honor Kneafsey, Eva Whittaker, Sean Bean, Simon McBurney, Tommy Tiernan, Maria Doyle Kennedy (voices).
Dirs: Tomm Moore & Ross Stewart.

A young apprentice hunter from a 1600's European village encounter mother-daughter "Wolfwalkers" who have mystical powers at a time when the villagers are hell-bent on wiping out the last wolf pack. I have to admit I have not seen any of director Tomm Moore's previous animated films (The Secret of Kells and Song of the Sea). I need to because he's terrific because this is quite simply one of the best films of the year so far. The best way I can describe this is "Irish Hayao Miyazaki". It's beautifully animated. The voice work is on-point. The script is thrilling, exciting, surprising and imaginative. I loved it.

Oscar Prospects: A shoo-in for Animated Feature. Should also get in Original Song.

Grade: A.

[anonymous1980]

THE TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7
Cast: Eddie Redmayne, Sacha Baron Cohen, Mark Rylance, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Frank Langella, John Carroll Lynch, Jeremy Strong, Alex Sharp, Michael Keaton, Ben Shenkman, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Daniel Flaherty, Noah Robbins.
Dir: Aaron Sorkin.

In the late 1960's, a group of men who were the leaders of various anti-Vietnam War protest groups were arrested and put on trial for starting the Chicago riots during the Democratic National Convention including Tom Hayden, Abbie Hoffman and Bobby Seale. This is their story. Aaron Sorkin's second feature directorial effort is a far more polished effort than Molly's Game. It still has both Aaron Sorkin's strengths as a writer as well as his weaknesses, particularly that ending (I have no idea if it actually happened but I think it's a bit much). The ensemble cast is aces here. For me, Sacha Baron Cohen, Mark Rylance and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II are the real standouts and would be deserving to be cited this awards season. Despite being very talky, the film moves and flows well and does give you a lot to chew on especially during these troubled times. It's far from perfect but a solid effort.

Oscar Prospects: Picture, Original Screenplay, Supporting Actor, Film Editing, Original Song are likely. Could make a play for Director, Score, Sound Mixing.

Grade: B+

[Big Magilla]

THE TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7
Cast: Eddie Redmayne, Alex Sharp, Sacha Baron Cohen, Jeremy Strong, John Carroll Lynch, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Mark Rylance, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Frank Langella, Michael Keaton.
Dir: Aaron Sorkin.

The first Oscar caliber film I've seen all year and finally one worth the Netflix expense.

Cutting to the chase, Sorkin's screenplay is a cinch to be nominated. He is a possibility for Director as well, but writing is his stronger suit. The film will be a Best Picture nominee but lacks the originality if not the oomph to be an easy winner.

Although most of the film takes place over the course of the six-month trial, it opens up just enough not to be claustrophobic.

The parallels to today's U.S. politics abound. John Mitchell was the worst attorney general the country has had in my lifetime until William Barr, but unlike Barr there was no kindly grandfatherly pretense. He was an asshole from the get-go and is portrayed as such. It was he who used his power and influence to go after the eight people brought to trial in the aftermath of the violence that erupted at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 1968 after his predecessor had declined to prosecute.

There has been a lot of talk in the blogosphere about which actors might be nominated for Best Supporting Actor, this being an ensemble piece with no discernible lead actor.

Most of the talk has centered on Sacha Baron Cohen as Abbie Hoffman for some reason. Personally, I don't get it. He and Jeremy Strong play Hoffman and fellow hippie Jerry Rubin as clowns through most of the film. I was much more impressed by Mark Rylance as a toned down William Kuntsler, the defendants' showboating attorney; Frank Langella as the nasty, bigoted Judge Julius Hoffman; and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as Bobby Seale, the anguished head of the Black Panthers and only black defendant, who was separated from the other defendants while the trial was underway. Eddie Redmayne was superb as Tom Hayden in the film's last two scenes, but he was underutilized for most of the film until then. Michael Keaton was also good as Ramsey Clark, Mitchell's predecessor under Lyndon Johnson, but his role was basically a cameo.

[Precious Doll]

Slow, slow, slow which was surprising giving the number of characters crudely dispatched one by one as the film drags it's heels. My partner thought it was the worst film he has seen all year until I made a very convincing case for Military Wives as the dud of 2020 (so far).

[Big Magilla]

THE DEVIL ALL THE TIME
Cast: Tom Holland, Robert Pattinson, Bill Skarsgard, Riley Keough, Jason Clarke, Sebastian Stan, Mia Wasikowska, Eliza Scanlen, Haley Bennett, Harry Melling, Kristin Griffith, Douglas Hodge.
Dir: Antonio Campos.

A young man who grew up in the rural South in between the Korean and Vietnam wars has to deal with his dark past as well as the tragedies and secrets of the present. First off, the performances of the ensemble cast led by Tom Holland and Robert Pattinson are stellar. They are excellent and faultless. The concept and the story have potential. You can tell that the source material is rich and quite dense. But that's also its downfall. The script is quite a bit of a mess. It wallows far too much on the tragedy and the darkness. As I was watching this, I'm imagining a better movie if the material was handled by either the Coen Brothers or Paul Thomas Anderson. It is worth checking out for the cast alone.

Oscar Prospects: Even in this year, Holland and Pattinson would be long shots.

Grade: B-

I actually liked this. Slow moving, yes, but it quickens the pace in the end. Pattinson's accent annoyed me, but Holland, Skarsgard, Keough, Clarke, Stan, Melling, Griffith, and Hodge are fine in the other principal roles. Others may have criticized it, but I thought the ending was perfect.

[anonymous1980]

THE BOYS IN THE BAND
Cast: Jim Parsons, Zachary Quinto, Matt Bomer, Andrew Rannells, Charlie Carver, Robin de Jesús, Brian Hutchison, Michael Benjamin Washington, Tuc Watkins.
Dir: Joe Mantello.

Based on the groundbreaking 1968 play and the similarly groundbreaking 1970 film adaptation, this is about a group of gay men gather around in an apartment for a birthday party and as the night goes on, secrets and frustrations bubble up into the surface. I recently saw the 1970 version and this one, produced by Ryan Murphy, is pretty much almost the same movie. It even borrows a lot of the visual cues from it. So it all kind of feels redundant and unnecessary so if you've seen the play or saw the 1970 film adaptation, is there anything about this movie that justifies its existence? The answer should obviously be the cast. Composed entirely of openly gay actors, this is a fine ensemble. If you haven't seen the play or the other movie, the material's strength still shines through. I will say though that Zachary Quinto is no Leonard Frey (from the 1970 version). Worth checking out if you haven't seen this piece in any incarnation but I recommend checking out the 1970 version first.

Oscar Prospects: None.

Grade: B-

[anonymous1980]

ENOLA HOLMES
Cast: Millie Bobby Brown, Henry Cavill, Sam Claflin, Helena Bonham-Carter, Louis Partridge, Burn Gorman, Fiona Shaw, Frances de la Tour, Adeel Akhtar, Susie Wokoma.
Dir: Harry Bradbeer.

Based on a series of young adult novels, this is about Sherlock Holmes and Mycroft Holmes' younger sister Enola as she goes on a series of adventures solving mysteries of both her mother's sudden disappearance and a young aristocrat on the run from murderers. Millie Bobby Brown proves that she's a star and gives us more of her fun, lighter side in this very enjoyable, fun adventure. She is supported by an equally appealing ensemble cast and together they make a really solid and engaging family film. If this is the first film of a possible franchise, I wouldn't mind it. I'd love to see more of these. It's a bit overlong, sure but you could do a lot worse with these types of films especially these days.

Oscar Prospects: None I think Millie Bobby Brown could get in Musical-Comedy Actress at the Globes.

Grade: B.