Movie/TV Reviews

Rendition

Susan Granger’s review of “Rendition” (New Line Cinema)

Considering the incendiary subject matter – the use of torture to extract information – this political thriller should be a lot more compelling than it is.
The title refers to America’s highly controversial “extraordinary rendition” policy, granting the government the right to hold anyone suspected of terrorism – without evidence or legal counsel; indeed, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled earlier this month not to hear Khaled el-Masri’s case on the basis of state secrets.
Reese Witherspoon plays the pregnant wife of Anwar El-Ibrahimi (Omar Metwaly), an Egyptian-born American chemical engineer on his way home to Chicago from a business conference in South Africa. Because there’s a suspicion that he might be linked to the death of a top CIA official in a suicide bombing in an unnamed North African country, he is abducted to a secret detention facility near Marrakech, Morocco, where he’s stripped naked and tortured. A rookie CIA analyst (Jake Gyllenhaal) is forced to observe the horrifying “interrogation” by a sadistic Arab (Israeli actor Igal Naor) whose daughter (Zineb Oukach), coincidentally, is secretly involved with the brother (Moa Khouas) of the leader of the radical Islamic group that her father is investigating.
Meanwhile, stateside, frantic Isabella heads to Washington D.C. where, conveniently, her old college beau (Peter Sarsgaard), coincidentally, works for a Senator (Alan Arkin). But this has little influence with the CIA’s terrorism chief (Meryl Streep), hiding her iciness under a cloak of patriotism.
Kelly Sane’s murky, confusingly structured script reeks of melodrama which – to his credit – Oscar-winning South African director Gavin Hood (“Tsotsi”) does his best to underplay while examining the repercussions of our “war on terrorism.” On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Rendition” is a troubling yet disappointing 6. Warning: the torture scenes are authentic and agonizing.

Rendition Read More »

Gone, Baby, Gone

Movie/TV Reviews / Susan

Susan Granger’s review of “Gone, Baby, Gone” (Miramax Films)

Ben Affleck makes a powerful directorial debut with this timely yet perplexing crime thriller about two private investigators searching for an abducted four year-old Boston girl.
No one could call irresponsible Helen McCready (Amy Ryan) a good mother. An admitted substance abuser (alcohol, cocaine, heroin), she’s thrust into the media spotlight when her four year-old daughter, Amanda, is kidnapped from their dingy apartment.
Distraught and dissatisfied with the investigation led by Capt. James Doyle (Morgan Freeman) and his Crimes Against Children unit, Amy’s aunt, Bea McCready (Amy Madigan) and her husband, Lionel (Titus Welliver), hire a team of young private detectives (Casey Affleck, Michelle Monaghan) who are familiar with the seedy denizens of their Dorchester neighborhood’s tight-knit underworld. Reluctantly, Capt. Doyle agrees to let them work with his experienced cops (Ed Harris, John Ashton), and they soon discover that $130,000 belonging to an unsavory Haitian drug dealer known as ‘Cheese’ (Edi Gathegi) went missing not long before Amanda disappeared. Could there be a connection?
Adapted from a novel by Dennis Lehane (“Mystic River”) by Aaron Stockard and Ben Affleck – who won an Oscar for co-writing “Good Will Hunting” – it’s filled with intriguing moral and ethical ambiguity. As a Boston native working with cinematographer John Toll, Affleck achieves the emotion-driven, working-class authenticity essential to the story’s believability.
Fresh from his villainous performance in “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford,” Casey Affleck (Ben’s younger brother) demonstrates his versatility as the perseverant, albeit baby-faced private eye. (In an amusing jibe, he’s told to go back to his Harry Potter book.)
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Gone, Baby, Gone” is an enigmatic 8 – with a challenging conclusion that’s bound to ignite conversation after the lights go on.

Gone, Baby, Gone Read More »

Slipstream

Movie/TV Reviews / Susan

Susan Granger’s review of “Slipstream” (Strand Releasing)

Considering that the dictionary defines slip stream as “the current of air thrust backward by the spinning propeller or an aircraft,” Anthony Hopkins has creatively transposed this aeronautical concept into an avante-garde, admittedly experimental, absurdist through-the-looking-glass glimpse of behind-the-scenes movie-making.
Evolving in a non-linear fantasy is the convoluted tale of a clearly unstable Hollywood screenwriter Felix Bonhoeffler (Anthony Hopkins), who is working on a murder mystery that’s being filmed in the California desert. Whirling in and out of his conscious and sub-conscious mind are his wife, Gina (played by Hopkins’ real-life wife, Stella Arroyave, making her screen debut); an aspiring blonde actress (Lisa Pepper); loquacious Aunt Bette (Fionnula Flanagan); a perplexed, baby-toting film director (Gavin Grazer); caustic cinematographer (Chris Lawford); obnoxious producer named Harvey Brickman (John Turturro); several long-suffering, somewhat maniacal actors (Christian Slater, Jeffrey Tambor, Michael Clarke Duncan, Camryn Manheim, S. Epatha Merkerson) and – miracle of miracles! – 93 year-old Kevin McCarthy recalling “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”). There’s also an amusing Dolly Parton look-alike (Charlene Rose), talking buzzard and furry tarantula.
Structurally reminiscent of Christopher Nolan’s non-linear, dream-like “Memento” with a dab of David Lynch thrown in, it’s written and directed by Anthony Hopkins (Oscar-winner for “The Silence of the Lambs”), who also composed the musical score. Working with cinematographer Dante Spinotti and film editor Michael E. Miller, Hopkins utilizes a visual cacophony of rapid cuts, old movie clips, stock footage and color film stock changes, often punctuated with seemingly random, out-of-context sound bites.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Slipstream” is a stream-of-consciousness, playfully surreal, satirical 7. As Hopkins notes, it’s the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party – and be sure to stay for the somewhat explanatory epilogue that occurs after the credits.

Slipstream Read More »

Things We Lost in the Fire

Movie/TV Reviews / Susan

Susan Granger’s review of “Things We Lost in the Fire” (Paramount/DreamWorks)

In her American debut, Danish director Susanne Bier tackles love, loss, jealousy, rage and recovery from drug addiction in a melodrama that unfolds slowly.at the pace of a death march.
Over the years, successful Seattle real estate developer Brian Burke (David Duchovny) has remained friends with his childhood buddy, Jerry Sunborne (Benicio Del Toro), a heroin addict, much to the chagrin of his uptight wife, Audrey (Halle Berry). But when Brian goes out for ice cream one night and is killed by a wife-abusing drunk, Audrey makes sure Jerry comes to the funeral, where he vows to quit drugs. Lost without a man around the house, Audrey invites him to move into an empty garage room that was damaged in an electrical blaze. While her precocious children – a 10 year-old girl (Alexis Llewellyn) and six year-old boy (Micah Berry) – are delighted, she’s ambivalent: kind and grateful one moment, rude and resentful the next.
Faced with overcoming Allan Loeb’s discordant, unrealistic, heavy-handed screenplay, Halle Berry tackles her first substantive role since her Oscar-winning turn in “Monster’s Ball.” Problem is: her querulous, one-note widow has no backstory: no job, no friends, no interests except her children. So it’s Benicio Del Toro’s cleverly nuanced performance that’s most memorable.
Director Susanne Bier cinematically interprets ’emotional intensity’ through endless close-ups of dark, sad eyeballs; this may be her austere European sensibility but it begins to resemble an ophthalmologist’s training film. When she’s not examining eyes, Bier’s into an earlobe fetish, having Audrey invite Jerry into her bed to cure her insomnia by pulling on her earlobe. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Things We Lost in the Fire” is an agonizingly morose, tedious 6, redeemed only by some remarkable acting.

Things We Lost in the Fire Read More »

Rails & Ties

Movie/TV Reviews / Susan

Susan Granger’s review of “Rails & Ties” (Warner Bros.)

Clint Eastwood’s daughter Alison makes an auspicious directing debut with this compelling family drama.
As the story begins, Megan Stark (Marcia Gay Harden), a nurse, is told that her long battle with breast cancer is ending. After surgery and chemotherapy, she’s determined to live her final weeks as fully as possible. But her taciturn husband, Tom (Kevin Bacon), is in total denial, channeling his emotions into the job he loves. He’s a railroad engineer, running the Stargazer Express between Los Angeles and Seattle.
Then a suicidal woman deliberately pulls her car on the tracks right in front of Tom’s on-rushing train, leaving her precocious, locomotive-loving 11 year-old son, Davey, an orphan. Fleeing from the foster home in which he’s placed, Davey tracks down Tom Stark and demands to know why he didn’t stop the train and save his mother.
Seizing the emotional opportunity, Megan reaches out to Davey – leaving Tom not only to confront the pending investigational hearing as a result of the accident but also to cope with the consequences of taking this ‘missing child’ into their home.
Utilizing contrivances and coincidences more suited for a movie-of-the-week on Lifetime TV, screenwriter Micky Levy delineates several lives on a bleak collision course. But actress-turned-director Alison Eastwood brings admirable spontaneity, understated intimacy and deft dexterity to her vision, astutely seeking collaboration with her father’s longtime cinematographer Tom Stern, production designer James Murakami and editor Gary Roach – adding her brother Kyle Eastwood’s evocative music.
What’s striking is the uncanny resemblance between Kevin Bacon’s reserved demeanor and verbal cadence and ‘early’ Clint Eastwood performances. Was that the actor’s choice or the director’s? On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Rails & Ties” is a heartfelt 7, particularly for an adult, female audience.

Rails & Ties Read More »

Lars and the Real Girl

Movie/TV Reviews / Susan

Susan Granger’s review of “Lars and the Real Girl” (M.G.M. release)

Who would think that the story of reclusive man and his mail-order sex doll would make a remarkably sensitive and tender, PG-13 romantic comedy?
Shy, withdrawn Lars Lindstrom (Ryan Gosling) lives a lonely existence in a sparsely furnished garage room next to his brother Gus (Paul Schneider) and pregnant sister-in-law Karen’s (Emily Mortimer) clapboard home in a nameless Midwestern town.
At work one day, Lars’ porn-addicted cubicle-mate shows him how you can order a life-size, pliable plastic ‘woman of your dreams’ on the Internet. A few weeks later when ‘Bianca’ arrives, Lars gently unpacks her and, that evening, escorts her to a family dinner, introducing her as his Brazilian/Danish girlfriend who cannot walk and, therefore, needs a wheelchair. Respectfully he explains how she’ll need her own room because, after all, they’re not yet married.
Alarmed yet fiercely protective, Gus and Karen insist they visit the family doctor/psychologist (Patricia Clarkson) who advises that everyone go along with Lars’ delusion.and, amazingly enough, they do. That includes the bewildered church ladies and Lars’ otherwise cynical co-workers, including a young woman (Kelli Garner) who has a crush on him. Perhaps that’s because their pastor poses the question: “What would Jesus do?” Indeed, due to the townspeople’s kindness and generosity, Bianca soon becomes an integral member of the tight-knit community.
Screenwriter Nancy Oliver (HBO’s “Six Feet Under”) and director Craig Gillespie (“Mr. Woodcock”) consistently downplay the obvious slapstick aspects while slowly developing the characters. After boldly matching wits with Anthony Hopkins in “Fracture,” Ryan Gosling affects a more unobtrusive, understated demeanor, yet never quite succeeding in convincing us that he’s sane. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Lars and the Real Girl” is a sentimental 7, chronicling a very strange relationship.

Lars and the Real Girl Read More »

American Gangster

Movie/TV Reviews / Susan

Susan Granger’s review of “American Gangster” (Universal Pictures)

Based on the true story of an enterprising hoodlum who became a billionaire by dominating the Harlem drug scene, Ridley Scott’s crime drama has been called “Superfly” meets “Serpico.”
Back in the 1970s, when drug trafficking belonged to the Mafia, amiable, soft-spoken Frank Lucas (Denzel Washington) chauffeured one of New York’s most notorious African-American mobsters, Ellsworth “Bumpy” Johnson. After his boss/mentor dies, Lucas quietly begins building his own empire. Astutely eliminating the middle man, he flies to Thailand to import heroin directly from Southeast Asia, arranging to have kilos hidden in caskets of American soldiers loaded onto military transports flying to New York from Vietnam.
Lucas’ “Blue Magic” is not only purer heroin but cheaper; twice the potency, it sells for half as much. Soon he’s making up to $1 million a day. While this entrepreneurship baffles and infuriates his rivals, it also catches the attention of Richie Roberts (Russell Crowe), a stubbornly incorruptible New Jersey cop who is determined to put him in prison, despite Lucas’ bribing the corrupt detective (Josh Brolin) heading New York’s anti-drug Special Investigations Unit.
Written by Steven Zaillian (Oscar-winner for “Schindler’s List”) from a New York magazine article (“The Return of Superfly”) by Mark Jacobson, it boosts director Ridley Scott up from his 2006 comedy debacle, “A Good Year,” also starring Russell Crowe, but, surprisingly, it offers little story-telling originality and gets downright tedious at times. But that’s not the fault of the Oscar-winning leads – Washington and Crowe – who deliver strong performances, as do Josh Brolin and Ruby Dee, as Lucas’ mother.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “American Gangster” is a well-crafted but eerily familiar 7, evoking memories of better gangster movies like “The Godfather,” “Scarface,” “Heat,” “GoodFellas” and “The Departed.”

American Gangster Read More »

Lions for Lambs

Movie/TV Reviews / Susan

Susan Granger’s review of “Lions for Lambs” (MGM/UA)

Ripped from today’s headlines, Robert Redford’s latest political thriller is a no-holds-barred indictment of recent U.S. foreign policy and George W. Bush’s seemingly endless “war on terror.”
As political science professor, Stephen Malley (Redford) is trying to motivate an extraordinarily bright but undisciplined student (Andrew Garfield), two of his former students (Derek Luke, Michael Pena), both idealists from underprivileged backgrounds, have enlisted as Army rangers and are engaged in a dangerous firefight in Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C., Janine Roth (Meryl Streep), a skeptical veteran television reporter, is interviewing charismatic Senator Jasper Irving (Tom Cruise) who, despite repeated denials, has Presidential ambitions. Right now, he’s revealing the U.S.’s new strategy of sending small Special Forces teams into to the mountains in Afghanistan to prevent Sunni and Shia insurgents from uniting. He’s so convincing in his logic that it’s terrifying.
Utilizing Matthew Michael Carnahan’s terse, intelligent script, deftly edited by Joe Hutshing, and eliciting frighteningly authentic performances from Cruise and Streep, Redford meshes multiple storylines, condemning media manipulation and public apathy and imploring Americans to take some responsibility for what’s happening.
The title comes from a W.W.I German general’s comment about the bravery of British troops and the ineptitude of their leaders: “Never have I seen such lions led by such lambs”.or as anguished Prof. Malley puts it, “where our courageous soldiers are put at risk by leaders who’ve never bled in a fight.”
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Lions for Lambs” is a defiant, compelling 10. What distinguishes this from other recent war movies is that it’s about far more than the tragic skirmish that takes place on the snowy mountainside. It’s provocative entertainment that makes you think.
(PERSONAL NOTE: My son, Don Granger, is president of MGM/UA.)

Lions for Lambs Read More »

Bee Movie

Movie/TV Reviews / Susan

Susan Granger’s review of “Bee Movie” (DreamWorks Animation/Paramount)

Call it the curse of high expectations but when Jerry Seinfeld makes his first animated feature, laughs should flow like honey but they don’t – unless you’re really into bee puns.
After college, bumblebee Barry B. Benson (Seinfeld) spends some time with the macho Pollen Jocks before starting work at the factory in New Hive City. Trapped in an apartment, he encounters a friendly florist, Vanessa (Renee Zellweger), who saves him from being annihilated by her boyfriend (Patrick Warburton). Breaking beedom’s code of behavior, Barry talks to her. In return, she shows him how humans buy honey at the store. Feeling exploited, Barry gets so furious about this injustice that he sues humankind.
After a courtroom fight – in which Sting (himself) is accused of stealing his stage name from bee culture – Barry wins, defeating a blustering Southern lawyer (voiced by John Goodman). So honey is taken off the market. Bees lose their production jobs at Honex, flowers don’t get pollinated and all vegetation in Central Park dies. If you’re in a New York state of mind, that spells ecological disaster for the world.
Flitting in the background, there’s a fast-talking mosquito Chris Rock), along with Barry’s pal, Adam (Matthew Broderick), and his parents (Kathy Bates and Barry Levinson) who worry about Vanessa: could she be a WASP? Plus Ray Liotta playing himself.
Forbes magazine reports that comic icon Jerry Seinfeld earns $60 million a year in syndication royalties and from his stand-up gigs, yet he’s the brain and voice of this simplistic yet heavily-hyped effort. Despite the weak writing, the computer animation is often eye-catching, although not up to Pixar standards. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Bee Movie” buzzes in as a surreal 6, an amusing 82-minute diversion.

Bee Movie Read More »

Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead

Movie/TV Reviews / Susan

Susan Granger’s review of “Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead” (ThinkFilm)

Esteemed director Sidney Lumet (“Serpico,” “12 Angry Men,” “Network,” “The Verdict,” “Q&A”) is still going strong at 83, proving it with this insightful, impeccably crafted crime drama that takes its title from the old Irish toast: “May you be in heaven a half hour before the devil knows you’re dead.”
Beginning with a steamy sex scene between Andy (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and his wife Gina (Marisa Tomei), a film noir about two financially pressured brothers emerges.
Andy’s a shady New York real estate accountant with an expensive drug habit, while his younger brother Hank (Ethan Hawke) is a none-too-bright, divorced loser who owes child support to his ex-wife. Hank’s also having a clandestine affair with Gina.
So when Andy comes up with a plan to heist their parents’ (Albert Finney, Rosemary Harris) suburban jewelry store, Hank goes along with the idea. But Hank brings along a reckless accomplice (Brian F. O’Byrne) and the robbery goes dreadfully awry, adding murder and blackmail to the brothers’ monetary problems.
What makes it so intriguing is that screenwriter Kelly Masterson and director Lumet reveal the family melodrama out of sequence, shifting the audience’s perspective onto each of the characters. Utilizing high-definition technology, Lumet, cinematographer Ron Fortunato and editor Tom Swartwout further augment the tension with close-ups and show the same scenes from different viewpoints. Sure, it’s contrived and there are some loose ends, but the perverse impact is greater than the sum of its parts.
Delivering outstanding performances, Philip Seymour Hoffman dominates anxious Ethan Hawke and vivacious Marisa Tomei, while Albert Finney is subtly menacing. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead” is a confident, compelling 9 with the moral undertones of classic Greek tragedy.

Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead Read More »