Category: Reviews

  • ‘The Muppets’ Wizard of Oz’ has its moments

    Ashanti accompanies (l. to r.) Gonzo, Pepe, Kermit and Fozzy down the yellow-brick road in 'Muppets’ Wizard of Oz'
    Ashanti accompanies (l. to r.) Gonzo, Pepe, Kermit and Fozzy down the yellow-brick road in ‘Muppets’ Wizard of Oz’

    To be honest, it has been a long time since I’ve really enjoyed a Muppet movie. I briefly caught some bits and pieces of The Muppets’ Wizard of Oz when it aired on ABC, and can’t say that I was that impressed. But watching it in its entirety on DVD, it wasn’t as bad as I expected. There are some good scenes, with bits of clever humor throughout, but nothing even remotely comparing to the magic of the early Muppet movies.

    What holds Oz down is its star, Ashanti. She has a lovely singing voice, but acting is clearly not her profession. Perhaps it was the fact that she was acting largely against puppets, but her awkward delivery really hinders the film. I understand why they wanted to cast a singer in the role, but they could have looked at someone with a little more acting experience (heck, Disney would probably have done better casting Raven Simone from their own series, That’s So Raven!).

    That aside, the most important thing with a Muppet movie is the humor, and there are some pretty funny moments throughout Oz.

    The story is pretty much the same as the classic tale, with some modern touches. Dorothy (Ashanti) is a waitress in Kansas working at her aunt and uncle’s diner. She longs to be a singer and escape her small time life to become a superstar. Her Aunt Em (Queen Latifah), however, is resistant to her leaving home. Dorothy tries to convince her aunt to let to attend an audition for Kermit and the Muppets, but she refuses. That doesn’t stop her uncle (David Alan Grier) from letting her go, but Dorothy doesn’t arrive in time. She gives Kermit a demo CD, and on her way home, a storm has started to form.

    The storm grows violent and a tornado wisks her and her pet shrimp, Toto, off to Oz. Her trailer accidentally kills the Wicked Witch of the East, and armed with her magical shoes, Dorothy is off down the yellow brick road to find the Wizard of Oz, who’ll apparently help her become a star. Along the way she meets a Scarecrow (Kermit), a T.I.N. Man (Gonzo), and a Cowardly Lion (Fozzie). But the Wicked Witch of the West (Miss. Piggy) aims to stop Dorothy and obtain the magical shoes.

    All the major story elements are the same as the classic film starring Judy Garland, just with slight twists. For example, Gonzo’s T.I.N. Man is actually a kind of robot connected to a computer system. Plus, the infamous flying monkeys enslaved by the Wicked Witch of the West are a motorcycle gang. The biggest twist is that Toto is a shrimp instead of a dog, a wise-cracking one with a Mexican accent. He actually provides some of the film’s best humor. For example, when the group first encounters the T.I.N. Man, Toto asks him what the nobs on his chest are for. “They’re my nipples,” he replies. Toto’s disgusted reaction is perfect.

    There are a handful of similarly funny moments throughout. Ultimately, you can overlook Ashanti’s performance, as well as Quentin Tarantino’s of odd cameo. It’s not The Muppet Movie, or even The Muppets’ Christmas Carol, but Oz still remains a fun family film.

    The extras on this DVD are funny, with a collection of hilarious outtakes, a behind the scenes documentary, and an interview with Tarantino, both of which are hosted by Pepe, the puppet who plays Toto.

  • ‘Pom Poko’ turns raccoons into heroes

    Raccoons plot their next move in 'Pom Poko'
    Raccoons plot their next move in ‘Pom Poko’

    It’s been quite a few years since American television began its obsession with Japanese animation, and I’ve never quite understood it. Most of the shows are terrible and are generally gimmicks to sucker kids into buying silly toys or goofy card games. Some of the films, like Spirited Away are visually stunning and beautifully told, but other times the films are rather strange, occasionally confusing, and sometimes just too long.

    That’s the problem with Pom Poko, which was released on DVD yesterday. It’s an interesting story, with some wonderful animation and good characters, but is just too darn long. Clocking in at nearly two hours, the story gets repetitive, with its resolution pretty obvious from the beginning.

    In Pom Poko, two warring clans of raccoons, who have the magical power of transformation, agree to an uneasy peace when humans begin tearing up their land to build a new development community. These two clans work together to fight the humans, but when plan after plan fails, and infighting among the raccoons worsens, they eventually discover they may be fighting a war they cannot win.

    I really liked the concept of Pom Poko, and was gung ho for the film at the beginning. But the over dependence on narration in the first twenty minutes gets tedious. Its followed by one scheme after another by the raccoons to stop the humans, with only a scattering of real story. None of these schemes really work, and at this point the slow moving film hasn’t really accomplished anything.

    There’s a love story that develops among the raccoons, but honestly for me the best character was Gonta, perhaps because he was voiced expertly in the English version I watched by Clancy Brown. Once a regular in Earth 2, and the power behind Lex Luthor in the Justice League animated series on Cartoon Network, he gives life to the angry and violent Gonta. But ultimately his character is the most interesting because he often causes trouble, pushing for more violent action against the humans, while often getting dismissed.

    By the end of the film I was left disappointed. My affection for the concept was not fulfilled, as the film slips into moments of silly humor too much. The idea of raccoons with the ability to transform themselves into anything is very clever, and their battle with humans fun, but the pacing of Pom Poko made it difficult to stay tuned in. Plus, a chunk of the film is simply the same concept replayed over and over again, which becomes tiresome.

    There are only a few special features to be found, including trailers and tv spots, as well as storyboards.

    Pom Poko for me was a disappointment, with an intriguing idea that wasn’t utilized to its fullest, and was about a half hour too long.

  • ‘The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion The Witch and the Wardrobe’ is too black-and-white, even for kids

    Anna Popplewell (left), William Moseley and Georgie Henley are siblings who become rulers of a mystical land in 'The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe'
    Anna Popplewell (left), William Moseley and Georgie Henley are siblings who become rulers of a mystical land in ‘The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe’

    The Chronicles of Narnia starts off well enough. The four engaging Pevensie children, Peter, Susan, Edmund and the irrepressible young Lucy, huddle in their living room while Hitler’s bombers strafe London. As the explosions near, their panicked mum herds them into the cellar. Next thing they know, they’re boarding a train for the safety of the English countryside. As their mother tearfully sends them off in the crush of the station, their anguish is palpable. Unfortunately, it is just about the most moving scene in the film. Because it is human.

    So, too, is the interplay between the siblings as they try to keep a stiff upper lip while making themselves at home in the huge country estate of the mysterious Professor Kirke (Jim Broadbent in a role better suited to Christopher Lloyd.) While these scenes are slow, there is definite life to them, and the sets are rich, varied, and intriguing. And so we are hopeful when Lucy, having found the perfect place to secret herself during a game of hide and seek, discovers that the wardrobe she’s climbed into is actually the door to a snow covered forest. Our sense of wonder grows as she meets a friendly faun (a.k.a., satyr) who introduces himself as Mr. Tumnus. Vividly played by James McAvoy, we feel a thrilling pinprick of magic, and are both delighted, and a little fearful, when Lucy happily agrees to go to his house for tea. His home turns out to be a hobbit like cave in the side of a rock hill with an arched door, and as she enters the look in his eyes tells us that all is not as benign as it seems. While we know that she can’t actually be in the kind of danger this intimates, it is still riveting.

    However, Mr. Tumnus is soon ushering Lucy back to the wardrobe and her “world”, putting himself in grave peril, and we know that the story everyone has come to see is about to begin. The trouble is, from the moment a few scenes later when Lucy and her siblings set foot onto snowy Narnian ground, the film begins to flatten. The story is so thin and underdeveloped that it feels surprisingly linear, as if we were following a very narrow path, with little knowledge of what lies on either side of it. The bleak winter landscape, which remains surprisingly monochromatic when spring finally blooms, adds to the monotony.

    Throughout we are only given the barest, most black and white details of what the kids have walked into. Aslan, a lion who apparently has been gone for the past hundred years, is the rightful the king of Narnia. From the moment he left, or was vanquished, or whatever happened, the evil White Witch (marvelously played by Tilda Swinton, who seems to have forgotten to take the hanger out of her dress) has been in change, and it’s been winter ever since. But, for some reason, there’s been no Christmas. Wait, Christmas? If Narnia is a mythical community devoid of humans, or as they so quaintly put it, “sons of Adam and daughters of Eve”, how the heck did they get a hold of Christmas? Okay, we all know the answer to that.

    The problem is that the Christian allegory laced into Narnia, while it will no doubt fly over the heads of the tots in the audience, has made mincemeat of the story. Sure, it has all the de rigueur elements of a fantasy epic — selflessness triumphs after great sacrifice (with a genuine resurrection, no less), bravery is rewarded, and good conquers evil. Regrettably, we don’t get enough of the specific story to really care. After Aslan’s mid-film homily, which isn’t helped by Liam Neeson’s mournful seriousness, there is no real attempt to make sense of what the ultimate battle is actually about. From the minute it begins, it’s as if all of Narnia has become a backdrop against which the Pevensie kids can work out their family loyalties.

    Unfortunately, the slow pacing gives one time to actually ponder many of the film’s more curious aspects. The most benign being the way the cute talking beavers seem to have cribbed their dialog from a sitcom -– the female beaver is concerned with her looks, the male, with her cooking.

    And there is something odd about the Pevensie brood. If they were puppies, you’d be sure Edmund had a different dad. The other three have wide blue eyes, and light hair. Edmund’s eyes are brown and his hair, nearly black. It’s quite jarring. My first thought was, what, they ran out of blue-eyed moppets? But when Edmund turns out to be the betrayer, it’s jarring again, in a decidedly darker way.

    But there is something darker still going on here. While Aslan’s army is full of large wholesome looking beasts, (their faces are for the most part human, their bodies graceful, their skin glows), the White Witch’s army is uniformly hideous. Ugly, deformed, twisted, small and slimy. In other words, sub-human. Thus, no one ever has to give a second thought to killing them. They deserve it. This simple minded demonizing of the enemy for the sake of “entertainment” leaves a legacy that the audience carries with it into the sunlight. Witness just about any war. And when it comes to Christian warfare, one doesn’t need allegory, although it’s probably more palatable than remembering the Crusades.

    In the end, when we watch from behind as the children stroll triumphantly through the castle that is now their own, we can’t help wishing that it was Luke, Leia and Han Solo who are about to take the stage. It sure looks like the same scene.

    And that leads to another nagging question: If these four siblings are now the kings and queens of Narnia, a country in which they are the only humans, where will the princes and princesses come from? Don’t answer. I want the sequel to surprise me.

  • ‘Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo’ is darn funny

    Rob Schneider in 'Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigalo'
    Rob Schneider in ‘Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo’

    Since 1999, I think I’ve heard Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo used more often as way to criticize a film than compliment it. The title alone was ridiculed, so much so that the fact that they made a sequel so many years later (it came out in 2005), I was shocked. So, you can understand that I was a little reluctant to actually sit down and watch this flick, but I was in the need for a good laugh and took a chance.

    I thought Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo was darn funny.

    Perhaps it’s my weakness for Rob Schneider, who I think is a good comedic actor and suffers mostly because he’s stuck in Adam Sandler’s shadow. He’s clearly been helped by Sandler, I’m not knocking that, but the dude’s gotta break away. Either way, I think he’s a funny guy, and Male Gigolo showcases his charms. He’s the average Joe, easily relatable and sympathetic. That likeability makes you feel for the guy as he goes through each humiliating experience.

    Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo has Schneider playing… well, Deuce Bigalow. He’s a down-and-out fish tank cleaner who has little luck with the ladies. When he has a chance encounter with a male gigolo named Antoine (Oded Fehr), Deuce is invited to watch his apartment loaded with high-priced items for three weeks. All goes well, until Deuce accidentally breaks a $6,000 fish tank. He then must become a gigalo to some “unique” women in order to raise enough money before the bad-tempered Antoine returns.

    It’s a pretty silly idea, but isn’t that what a comedy is supposed to be? The humor isn’t really all that crude, and none of the “unique” women are treated as jokes or punch lines. In other words, Deuce Bigalow is not a mean movie. They don’t make fun of people, instead the movie shows these often alienated women as real human beings.

    Schneider, I think, is charming as Deuce. He’s not a goody-goody type, but he’s a good guy. Although he could have easily been written as this all-too nice guy, the scenes where he regularly gets the pet store girl to “unknowingly” dip her breasts into the cold fish tank water is perfect. That one running gag prevents Deuce from being annoyingly nice. Schneider also does a great job of mixing physical comedy with the more dialogue driven humor. William Forsythe plays a role that is easily different than anything I’ve seen him in before, and I’m still not sure what to make of it.

    This new “Little Black Book Edition” has the same “making of” featurette from the first DVD release, but there are some new extras. There’s a video diary by the film’s director, Mike Mitchell. It’s really not a diary, so much as a montage of video footage shot during filming. It’s entertaining for a while, but is a little longer than it needed to be. There’s also “Fly on the Set”, which is entertaining, and several deleted scenes.

  • ‘The Emperor’s New Groove’ gets ‘special’ treatment on DVD

    Pacha (left) and Kuzco are back-to-back in 'The Emperor’s New Groove'
    Pacha (left) and Kuzco are back-to-back in ‘The Emperor’s New Groove’

    The Emperor’s New Groove was one of those handful of Disney movies in recent years that I’ve seen in the theaters. I wasn’t really expecting much from it, because it’s been a while since I was all that impressed by Disney’s animated films. I was actually pleasantly surprised, because the film was pretty funny, with some outstanding animation work and memorable characters.

    The story has a spoiled young emperor named Kuzco (David Spade), and a peasant named Pacha (John Goodman) in whose care Kuzco winds up after a failed assassination attempt turns him into a llama. This brat of an emperor must then rely on the kind-hearted Pacha to regain power, and ultimately save Pacha’s village from destruction.

    I honestly laughed quite a lot at this film. It’s funny, entertaining, and Spade and Goodman work well off each other — even though they only provided the voices and didn’t actually do so in the same room or at the same time. But the performers brought a lot to their characters, thanks to the animators, and somehow it fit together neatly. Of course, I’m a Goodman fan, so I end up liking just about every character he plays.

    Another element that makes The Emperor’s New Groove so entertaining is the back-and-forth between the two villains, Kronk (Patrick Warburton) and Yzma (Eartha Kitt). It’s easily one of the most entertaining bad guy pairings I’ve seen in a Disney film in a long time.

    These great and fun characters are brought alive through Disney’s outstanding animation, and we get an eyeful of beautiful work here. The fluid style and colorful pallet are just a joy to watch. And as much as I love traditional animation, there is something about the small elements of CGI that really enhance it. Something in the way it creates a more natural sense of motion that can’t be done quite the same using traditional two-dimensional methods.

    I think there was a time when Disney releasing an animated film was an event within itself. It hit its peak in the mid 1990s, with films like Lion King andPocahontas, where these releases were grand events with a lot of fanfare and presentation. No other studios were actively producing animated films then, leaving Disney all alone and without much if any competition. Then came Dreamworks Animation, and Warner Bros. established an animation division (which later folded after the underappreciated Iron Giant).

    Suddenly, all that competition meant that Disney needed to start churning out more and more films. As a result, the Disney annual releases were no longer events. That’s about the time that The Emperor’s New Groove was released, and it probably didn’t get as much praise as it would have had it come out a little earlier. It followed in the mold of Mulan in that it features an ethnic cast of characters — in this case, South Americans. But it was also very entertaining, and perhaps as the years go by it’ll gain more appreciation.

    This “special edition” DVD is nothing like the grand editions Disney has been putting out for its classics like Bambi and Cinderella, but it does the job just fine (and helps boost word for the upcoming sequel, Kronk’s New Groove, hitting DVD shelves in December). It’s basically a slimmed-down version of the “Ultimate Groove” two-disc DVD Disney released last year.

    This new edition has three behind-the-scenes featurettes, which really don’t reveal much about the film’s production (like how it was originally supposed to be a completely different film based upon The Prince and the Pauper that was to be dramatic and titled “Kingdom of the Sun” and had been overhauled into a wackier film). The audio commentary mentions it a bit, but focuses mostly on the production of the film. There are also three deleted scenes (which were from the “ultimate” edition), a pair of music videos, and some games for the kiddies.

  • ‘The Muppet Movie’ retains its charm as Kermit turns 50

    Kermit, Gonzo and Fozzie Bear get together to entertain in 'The Muppet Movie'
    Kermit, Gonzo and Fozzie Bear get together to entertain in ‘The Muppet Movie’

    It’s hard to describe the magic of the Muppets to kids today. From my son’s perspective, he actually has very little interest in puppets on television. He’s more interested in cartoons and computer animated films. But put on the Muppets, and he’s off to his room to play with his toys.

    I remember seeing The Muppet Movie for the first time on video when I was a kid. Not old enough to see it in the theaters, or remember doing so if I did, I remember loving the adventures of Kermit the Frog and Fozzie Bear. When I was younger, it was Kermit who I liked best, but over the years my attraction as shifted to his furry sidekick. There’s something about the wanna-be stand up comedian that makes me laugh all the time.

    Anyway, this original film was the first to feature the lovable Jim Henson creations. It came on the heels of the successful The Muppet Show, which at the time of its release in 1979 had aired on television for three years. It included all of the famous Muppet characters in one capacity or another, with its basic premise to show how all the characters met and found their way to Hollywood.

    Kermit (performed by Jim Henson) was living a content but unfulfilled life in the jungle, with a chance encounter with a Hollywood agent causes him to head to Los Angeles in hopes of becoming a star. Along the way he meets up with Fozzie Bear, Gonzo, and Miss Piggy. They journey across country on a bizarre road trip, pursued by Doc Hopper (Charles Durning), a fast-food restaurant owner who wants to open a franchise business based around frog legs, and believes Kermit would make the perfect spokesman.

    The concept of the film was inspired by Jim Henson’s real experience of getting into the business. It includes a collection of cameos, including Steven Martin, Dom DeLuise, Mel Brooks and Bob Hope, as well as Orson Welles, whose role is an homage to British producer Lew Grade, who helped bring The Muppet Show to life. With a mixture of slap-stick comedy and musical numbers, The Muppet Movie helped solidify the Muppets as bonafide pop culture icons.

    My favorite portion of the film is when Kermit and Fozzie meet, as this pairing is one of my favorite aspects of the Muppets. And while I have never been a fan of musicals, the handful of tunes here are great, most especially “Rainbow Connection”, a heartwarming and classic song. The film’s most magical moment is the bicycle scene, where Kermit first leaves the swamp. It’s one of those rare moments where the puppets are seen fully on screen, with no hands attached to provide the movement. It’s not exactly fancy, but at the time it was a great bit of movie magic, one that today would probably have been achieved through some form of digital trickery.

    The restored audio and video of The Muppet Movie are terrific, and I think it’s good that they allowed the option of watching the film in “widescreen” or “full screen” as well (just so people can see why fullscreen sucks). The disappointing part of this 50th anniversary DVD release is that there are no real special features. There’s a mildly funny profile of Kermit hosted by Pepe the King Prawn, a character introduced in the recent The Muppet’s Wizard of Oz, but that’s it. I would have thought this would have made for a terrific opportunity to release a true special edition DVD of The Muppet Movie, with behind-the-scenes footage or a retrospective of some kind. Jim Henson died in 1990, Richard Hunt in 1992, and Jerry Juhl, who co-wrote several Muppet films and was a head writer on The Muppet Show, also died this past September. I would hate to think that so much time would pass and many of the people who helped create these indelible characters will be gone before some effort is made to preserve their stories.

  • Jane Fonda’s 1977 film ‘Julia’ is not a perfect film, but it certainly captures some perfect performances

    Jane Fonda’s 1977 film ‘Julia’ is not a perfect film, but it certainly captures some perfect performances

    Jane Fonda and Vanessa Redgrave in 'Julia'
    Jane Fonda and Vanessa Redgrave in ‘Julia’

    Fred Zinneman is never the first name that comes up when naming the great directors of our time, but it certainly could be. With masterpieces like From Here to Eternity, High Noon, and A Man for All Seasons, he demonstrated an amazingly versatile range in telling complex narratives about the human struggle to pursue and, in some cases, fight for, what is good among many different backdrops.

    Another example of that is Julia, new to DVD. The 1977 film is not a perfect film, but it certainly captures some perfect performances. Julia is the best friend of writer Lillian Hellman (Jane Fonda), and the film takes place during Hellman’s rise to stardom in the 1930s, as Julia became a more aggressive fighter of Fascism. While Julia attends the University of Vienna and works on her landmark play The Children’s Hour with lover Dashiell Hammett (an outstanding Jason Robards), Julia (Vanessa Redgrave) beseeches Lillian to smuggle money through Nazi Germany in order to aid her cause.

    While the movie should really be Julia’s story, Hellmann is the protagonist (indeed, Redgrave’s Oscar win was in the Supporting Actress category). She tells Julia’s story from her perspective, a bit of an odd structure on the part of screenwriter Alvin Sargent. It would be a more clever movie had Hellman’s recollection perhaps been subjective, but the audience is to believe he from an objective standpoint, buying into events for which Hellman was never actually present to document.

    Zinneman and Sargent do not provide too much to support the Julia-Lillian friendship: just a couple of scenes of the two getting to know each other in childhood and then meeting up later in life when taking a break from their very elaborate lives. As a result, Hellman’s story is as much admiration for Julia as it is reportage. She knows enough about her to reliably provide the audience the facts. Yet Julia also remains a bit of an enigma. Julia captures all of the ups and downs in Hellman’s world, but cannot parallel them for Julia. Who even knows what these could have been? This clever act of omission may have been born of necessity, much like the little-seen shark in Jaws, but it achieves the desired effect. It leaves us wanting more.

    Julia’s story is fascinating, but so is the story of Hellman’s famed relationship with Hammett – the lost themselves in booze and in words, and occasionally, each other. They fought, but only hurt each other because their words mattered so much to one another. After agonizing over countless rewrites of her play, one of Hammett’s most romantic gestures is to compliment her work. (Robards, too, scored a supporting Oscar for Julia — in a rare coup, he had also won the same award the previous year.)

    While the relationships sometimes lack enough intimacy to make them fully believable, Julia is nonetheless a harrowing work, and another testament to Zinneman’s great legacy.

  • 1982 gay love story ‘Making Love’ had high hopes, but made little impact

    1982 gay love story ‘Making Love’ had high hopes, but made little impact

    Michael Ontkean and Kate Jackson in 'Making Love'
    Michael Ontkean and Kate Jackson in ‘Making Love’

    It’s hard to say whether Making Love was groundbreaking or merely sensational when it was released 24 years ago, but the slight soap opera certainly made little impact either way.

    Arthur Hiller, director of the sob-fest Love Story a decade earlier directs this predictable story of homosexuality and infidelity. Erstwhile small screenstar Michael Ontkean is Zack, a successful young doctor in Los Angeles married to the equally successful Claire (Kate Jackson, on of Charlie’s original Angels). When Bart McGuire (hunk du jour Harry Hamlin), a sexually adventurous writer, enters the fray, everything changes. Soon Zack finds himself distancing himself from Claire and pursuing a heretofore repressed homosexual inclination.

    Love was a hotly anticipated film when it was first released, as the long-awaited “gay” movie, but it does little justice to its theme – or any theme, for that matter. A. Scott Berg’s story is a just-the-facts treatment that never digs any deeper than its tagline. Zack and Claire’s marriage is presented cookie-cutter style, suggesting no chemistry, history or nuance at all. Why would Zack stray? We don’t know any more than we know why he was attracted to Claire in the first place.

    There is nary any more heat generated between Ontkean and Hamlin, who appear drawn together only because puppeteers are telling them to do so. Hamlin doesn’t know how to play Bart, a commitment-shy lothario, and one never believes he could actually be a writer. Or perhaps he can only be as good as his creator. With dialogue like “If it feels good, do it. You don’t get any points for playing by the rules,” Berg (who also co-wrote Katharine Hepburn’s posthumous memoir) and Barry Sandler haven’t exactly crafted the sequel to Citizen Kane here.

    So what we get is a movie that takes no chances, particularly in the area of sexuality. There doesn’t need to be graphic sex or nudity to make for a convincing relationship between any character here, but this by-the-numbers script and the male actors’ tentative relations with one another (most likely due to discomfort on Hamlin’s and Ontkean’s parts) make for a very unconvincing movie. Poor Jackson stands alone as a model of dedication, but dancing as fast as she can isn’t enough to keep this turkey from gobbling.

  • ‘Separate Lies’ asks a lot of hard questions, but only answers some of them

    ‘Separate Lies’ asks a lot of hard questions, but only answers some of them

    Tom Wilkinson and Rupert Everett in 'Separate Lies'
    Tom Wilkinson and Rupert Everett in ‘Separate Lies’

    This year’s roster of Best Actor nominees is indeed impressive, but it would have been more so had it included Tom Wilkinson. Certainly the actor’s smoldering work in 2005’s little-seen Separate Liesis among the most revelatory work of the year.

    In the film – the directorial debut of Oscar-winning Gosford Park scripter Julian Fellowes, Wilkinson plays James Manning, a successful, well-respected attorney who seems to have it all. His word slowly unravels, however, when the husband of his cleaning lady becomes the victim of a hit-and-run. Eventually, neighbor Bill Bule (Rupert Everett) becomes a suspect in the matter, and as the greater truth is revealed, James begins to suspect that his loyal wife Anne (Emily Watson) might not be so loyal after all.

    Tom Wilkinson and Emily Watson in 'Separate Lies'
    Tom Wilkinson and Emily Watson in ‘Separate Lies’

    At every turn, James finds himself at a crossroads, as Lies is all about the choices we make to protect the ones we love – and preserve our own happiness. James has his own secrets as well, and as Fellowes’ film unravels, he makes clear the damage such secrecy can do.

    All three members of this triangle prove to be masters at this subterfuge. And Fellowes excels at homing in on the dramatic richness of domestic discord. In one scene, as Anne delivers some unsettling news to James, Watson methodically chops vegetables, her knife punctuating the scene with all the strength of a guillotine.

    What is interesting is Anne’s relationship with Bill. He has no expectations of her and makes no judgments, and this no-strings arrangement is exactly the antidote to Anne’s relationship with James. While the actions of the three may cause some damage, ultimately it’s what they tell each other – first the lies, then the more piercing truths – that hurt the most.

    So what does keep a marriage going? According to one scene, Fellowes posits that the answer may indeed be children. As James’ marriage disintegrates, he sees a child in the park and considers how his marriage may have been strengthened had he and Anne had children to provide a greater bond. Fellowes has created a movie that asks many tough questions about both guilt and blame, and toughest of all, he provides few answers.

  • Jack Nicholson and Michael Caine are electric in ‘Blood and Wine’

    Jack Nicholson and Michael Caine are electric in ‘Blood and Wine’

    Jack Nicholson and Michael Caine in 'Blood and Wine'
    Jack Nicholson and Michael Caine in ‘Blood and Wine’

    Sometimes an actor can save a weakly-made film. In Bob Rafelson’s 1996 dud Blood and Wine, though, two of the greatest actors of all time, Michael Caine and Jack Nicholson, are left to work overtime. And the results still disappoint.

    Nicholson is Alex Gates, a Florida wine dealer with a failing business and marriage. He and Victor Spansky (Caine) conspire to lift a million-dollar diamond necklace from the mansion of a rich family. But the lot requires so many twists, turns, conveniences and suspensions of disbelief that one is better left off forgetting the convoluted mess.

    Also caught up in the crossfire are several other characters: Alex’s wife Suzanne (Judy Davis, always a marvel but wasted here), her son, and Alex’s stepson, Jason (Stephen Dorff), and Gabrielle, a nanny who becomes a pawn in Alex’s plan (Jennifer Lopez, generating some heat with Nicholson but failing to deliver one convincing line of dialogue at any turn).

    Nicholson is, of course, sublime, on a roll after his triumph a year earlier in The Crossing Guard. He finds all the complexity – the desperation, the stubbornness, even the romantic side – of Alex. He courts Gabrielle as part of his scheme, and always keeps us guessing as to how much he is using her, and how much he is actually falling for her.

    Caine is a perfect match for Nicholson. Victor is decadent as can be. He puts himself in violent situations uses his body as a punching bag and waste receptacle, and doesn’t waste a minute turning his violent hand on somebody else. Victor is a loser, but he knows it. For better or worse, he is a crook by nature, and will always walk the crooked path.

    Rafelson is best known for his work from the 1970s, especially 1970’s Five Easy Pieces, one of Nicholson’s best performances. (The two have also worked on The King of Marvin Gardens, The Postman Always Rings Twice remake, and Man Trouble.) His strength has always lain in character, rather than story structure, and at times, Blood appears too padded. Virtually all characters have some sort of connection o each other as a result. Dorff and Lopez do not always justify their characters’ motivations, but Davis is uncanny in the way she takes a nothing role and makes it worthwhile, reflecting Suzanne’s anger, betrayal and hurt. It’s a pleasure watching artisans like her, Caine and Nicholson at play; one only wishes they had a better game.