An Affair to Remember

Year: 1957
Genre: Romantic Comedy
Directed: Leo McCarey
Stars: Cary Grant, Deborah Kerr, Richard Denning, Neva Patterson, Cathleen Nesbitt, Robert Q. Lewis, Charles Watts
Production: Twentieth Century Fox

Even as far back as Hollywood's golden age, the studios have always been accused of running low on ideas. We have the proof in movies like The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956), Pocketful of Miracles (1961) and The Blue Angel (1959) all stale, repetitious remakes of superior 1930's counterparts. As much as we like to put on our rose-colored glasses and imagine An Affair to Remember as a classic Cary Grant romantic comedy/drama, it is in fact a story that has already been told, in a little known tale called Love Affair (1939). At least Twentieth Century Fox had the smarts to put the same director on the job; Leo McCarey, famous for making the Marx Brothers' funniest movie Duck Soup (1933). Here though McCarey is seemingly struggling to make his story just as exciting and relevant as the original.

Hitchcock, is that you?

Cary Grant plays Nickie Ferrante an infamous playboy and tabloid stable. His highly publicized affairs with the rich and famous seems to have come to a halt when he engages New York heiress Lois Clark (Patterson). While on-board a luxury liner however, Ferrante meets Terry (Kerr) the fiancee to a Texas oil baron. Both are affianced so naturally they become attracted to each other. Before leaving the ship to their respective fates, the two make a pact to meet each other at the top of the Empire State Building in six months. If both have broken their engagements and started work on their true ambitions (Nickie an artist; Terry a singer), they will get married.

Love Affair (1939)

McCarey recycles the exact same script from the 1939 version that was first penned by Donald Ogden Stewart and Delmer Daves. The updates either pad the running time or are purely superficial; replacing Charles Boyer and Irene Dunne with Grant and Kerr, filming in color, adding a few more syrupy moments and including "An Affair to Remember (Our Love Affair)" into the soundtrack. What results is a movie that's stagy, bereft of tension and more than a little silly. It's a shame too because Grant and Kerr do a great job with what they're given. Even when Kerr is forced to sit on a sofa unable to tell her beloved Nickie her secret (for reasons of pride?) she swallows that contrivance the way only a British film veteran could.

And of course just like The Prince and the Showgirl (1957) and Funny Face (1957) the advent of technicolor proved this film's downfall. With the inclusion of technicolor there was a boon to film genres like epics, westerns and war movies which benefited from capturing the natural beauty of the great outdoors. Yet for studio films, technicolor exposed the audience to the phony filigree surrounding their favorite stars and starlets. Is it any wonder the best movies of 1957 not in the aforementioned genres were all in black and white? 12 Angry Men (1957), Witness for the Prosecution (1957) and Sweet Smell of Success (1957) all relied heavily on sets, all black and white and all better than An Affair to Remember by a long shot.

I'm gonna go see if Desk Set (1957) is playing in the next theater.
You in?

Presented with a thick film of nostalgia by Netflix (no doubt to cash in on those sultry sexagenarian Valentines), An Affair to Remember is simply not worth the fuss. Released and remembered fondly as the ultimate love story and nominated for multiple Oscars, the movie has aged like a cold fish stew. Do not use this film as the basis for judging the primary proprietors of such schlock. Leo McCarey made great films...in the 30's. Meanwhile Grant and Kerr were nominated several times at the Academy Awards (though never won) and there's a reason for that. It's just not An Affair to Remember.

Final Grade: D

Monkeybone

Year: 2001

Genre: Comedy

Directed: Henry Selick

Stars: Brendan Fraser, Bridget Fonda, John Turturro, Chris Kattan, Giancarlo Esposito, Rose McGowan, Dave Foley, Megan Mullally, Bob Odenkirk, Whoopi Goldberg

Production: Twentieth Century Fox

Their are many reasons for a movie to be in the running for worst film ever made. Movies like Plan 9 From Outer Space (1959) and The Beast From Yucca Flats (1961) are often mentioned because of their overall low quality. Once I sat down and watch them however, I either saw them as unintentionally funny, surprisingly earnest or otherwise undeserving of such an abysmal reputation. Monkeybone on the other-hand remains one of only a handful of movies that has left me simultaneously awestruck and angry; stupefied and seething. A cringe and groan inducing mess that is certainly my official pick for worst movie ever made.

Brendan Fraser stars as a successful cartoonist who falls into a coma after an accident, the details of which are too stupid to mention, and ends up in a parallel universe inside his mind where he meets his creation Monkeybone (voiced by John Turturro). Monkeybone, a lascivious little monkey with a penchant for chaos takes over his body and wreaks havoc on his relationship with his girlfriend/psychiatrist. Fraser (still in his own head we think), makes a plea to Death (Goldberg) and is loaned a body to win back his girl before Monkeybone gets his dirty ape hands on her.

Well at least I'm not in Theodore Rex (1995)

Co-stars Bridget Fonda, Megan Mullally, Dave Foley, Rose McGowan and Chris Kattan round-up an unremarkable list of "talent" that were hired to stand behind stop-motion models and in front of rejected Beetlejuice (1988) sets. The dark atmosphere of the movie struggles to integrate its scatological humor, most of which is provided by an obnoxious cartoon monkey. Its obvious the film was edited into oblivion in post-production which would account for the lion's share of the plot holes but my question is to what end? Sure it made the movie shorter (thank god!) but the plot still took two acts to actually get moving. Once it did it sprightly rushed into the last 15 minutes like a morbid Tom and Jerry cartoon.

Representation of my soul while watching Monkeybone

What was the prime demographic for this movie? I think the David Lynch crowd is a bit beyond poop jokes at this point and its far too dark for children. Arguably the saddest thing about this film however is the lost potential in director Henry Selick, whose previous work includes Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) and James and the Giant Peach (1996). While Selick has since redeemed himself with Coraline (2009), Monkeybone presents the director at his nadir.

Truly the work of Satan

Monkeybone truly bats and misses on all points. Its An ugly looking hatchback with no engine, a busy yet boring quagmire. At its very best its a slap-dashed movie that is literally all dressed up with no where to go. It showcases bad direction, bad acting, bad editing, bad cinematography, bad script, bad story. I honestly would be ashamed to be this film's boom mic operator (which is visible in one scene). The failure of this film is actually quite spectacular when you think about it. Watch it if you're masochistic, otherwise stay far away from Monkeybone!

Final Grade: F

Hail, Caesar!

Year: 2016
Genre: Showbiz Comedy
Directed: Joel & Ethan Coen
Stars: Josh Brolin, George Clooney, Alden Ehrenreich, Scarlett Johansson, Tilda Swinton, Channing Tatum, Ralph Fiennes, Frances McDormand, Jonah Hill
Production: Working Title Films

One thing is abundantly clear while walking out of Hail, Casear!, the Coen Brothers' newest screwball comedy, it will divide audiences. Amid the throngs of people who walked away from the screen into the lobby, I couldn't help but notice many different factions all vying to make a point about the movie's quality. Some were upset at the assumed pointlessness of the entire ordeal while some were excited and even elated by what just transpired. One thing is for certain; no one left the theater quietly.

Hail, Caesar! is a anarchic comedy detailing a dizzying day in the life of Eddie Mannix (Brolin) the Head of Physical Production and resident "fixer" for Capitol Pictures. Beginning during a brooding Los Angeles evening, Eddie goes to confession before going about his business forming, making and protecting the studio's investments i.e. the stars. It's easier said than done however, unseen Studio Head Mr. Skank, wants B-Western Star Hobie Doyle (Ehrenreich) re-branded as a romantic leading man. Meanwhile musical star DeeAnna Moran (Johansson) is pregnant and refuses to marry the father which proves a problem for the studio's squeaky-clean image. Finally there's Capitol Picture's greatest marquee star Baird Whitlock (Clooney), an oaf with a history of Hollywood shenanigans who is ransomed by a cabal of disgruntled Communist writers.

These are the basic premises of the plot but just like most other Coen Brothers' movies, the setups are simply there to highlight the inanity, eccentricities and sincerity of the characters. The screwiness of said characters bring to mind the ensemble cast of Burn After Reading (2008) only the story has the quixotic ambling of The Big Lebowski (1998) and the amiable goofiness of Raising Arizona (1987). Josh Brolin has never done a better job, playing the gruff but likable Mannix. Even when he's tempted to jump ship and work for Lockheed his affection for his work, his co-workers and his family all seem genuine. His likability is rivaled only by Alden Ehrenreich's performance as an honest working man turned cornball tobacci-spitter. Beneath his fish-out-of-water boyishness lies a shrewdness that helps tie the film in a nice little semi-conclusion.

No one really knows what's going on.

If one were to find a comparable Coen Brothers movie to Hail, Caesar! it wouldn't be any of the ones I just listed. I would argue Hail, Caesar! has the same religious undertones to A Serious Man (2009) as evidenced by the continuous religious iconography and symbolism. Mannix, much like Michael Stuhlbarg's character in A Serious Man is in the middle of an existential crisis and tries to find meaning in a never-ending escalation of problems. Difference is Mannix finds the answers he's looking for. He finds them not in the confessional, nor the easy route at Lockheed, nor in discussions of entertainment culture representing a new form of social control; he finds it at the movies.

There's a pivotal scene near the beginning of the film that feels like the beginning of an old joke. Mannix sits in a room with a priest, a minister, an Eastern Orthodox clergyman and a rabbi. He explains the prestige picture the studio is releasing (starring Whitlock), telling the story of Jesus through the eyes of a Roman centurion. They're asked if anything in the film is offensive to which they vehemently argue. They ultimately agree on only two things; 1. God is divine, 2. The movie is okay.

All hail Fall Out Boy!

That pretty much sums up the Coen Brothers' view on movies which like Nationalism, Communism and yes even Religion can be used to inspire and/or control. Generally people ascribe themselves into various tribes based on common attributes or principles. We almost act like Russian nesting-dolls of identity, many of us claiming to be for example; Americans first, Anglican second, Fall Out Boy fans third and so on. Mannix doesn't know if he should be a Capitalist first and a Hollyood man second ultimately deciding with repeated slaps to George Clooney's smug face. Showbiz is his tribe and he worships the stories they tell no matter how corny or over-broad or saccharine.

Your opinion of this film will largely be determined by how you rank movies within your own identity. For yours truly, Hail, Caesar! is further affirmation that the Coen Brothers simply cannot make a bad movie. Yet there are plenty of reasons not to like this movie if you're not a filmophile including the Coens' patented quirkiness (which there is a lot of). I suppose in this world, everyone's a critic.

Final Grade: B-

Thoughts from the Usher Podium: Why Some of Your Favorite Movies Suck

About a month ago I audaciously, bravely, nay heroically divulged some of my Guiltiest Pleasures here on this very blog. I gave my dedicated readers (hi mom!) a Top Ten list of decidedly bad movies that nonetheless I enjoy and am willing to support. Now, as if my reputation weren't sullied enough, I think it is time to do the opposite (and piss off the rest of you). I shall give you a list of Top Ten movies everyone seems to like except me. Whatever dictum applied to my Guilty Pleasures, the opposite now becomes the rule here. These are films that are well loved by critics and audiences alike and are largely Box-Office successes.

10. Risky Business (1983)
Oh Tom Cruise, you were such a heartthrob when you started your meteoric rise as one of Hollywood's most bankable stars. Risky Business is fondly remembered as the star's breakthrough performance, a rich high school student with a penchant for listening to Bob Segar's Old Time Rock and Roll while in his underwear. What we often don't remember about this movie is the entire plot revolves around Cruise turning his parents' house into a brothel for a night.

Behold the face of total lack of self-reflection

There is certainly some unsavory gender politics in this film including the objectification of Rebecca De Mornay who at first seems to be in charge but is twiddled away by Cruise's advances and pimp Guido's (Joe Pantoliano) machinations. The satire (and yes it supposed to be a satire you cretin) is sharp but is wholly undone by the typical Hollywood happy ending. Finally while many remember the Soundtrack fondly, the Tangerine Dream bits by today's standards, now sound like you're playing a Sim City game with it's pulsing, mundane, New Wave vibe. Face it, unlike Tom Cruise, Risky Business simply hasn't aged well as entirely represented by our protagonist sitting in the middle of a Princeton interview spouting "sometimes you have to say what the f**k" is if it's a nugget of well-worn wisdom. Thanks the 80's; for giving an entire generation the collective attitude of Gordon Gekko.

9. Big Hero 6 (2014)
Big Hero 6 is a well beloved recent classic to be sure, yet the lesson it should have taught and was well on it's way to expounding was completely thrown out like yesterday's bath water halfway through the movie. Allow me to explain; in the beginning of the film our hero...Hiro is spending his days fighting robots instead of doing his homework and thinking about his future. His brother Tadashi convinces him he should put his mind and skills to better use by introducing Hiro to his friends at the University robotics center. Hiro is convinced he can do a lot of good by going to school and joins in on the Science Fair with his nano-bot technology. Message: become an engineer and save the world...then comes the next act.

On this scale, the level of disappointment is at about a 9

Tadashi dies and Hiro vows revenge on the mysterious man who started the fire that ended his brother's life and stole Hiro's technology. To do this he takes his brother's surviving research (a medical robot named Baymax) and turns him into a killing machine. Let me repeat; Hiro takes a robot meant to help people, a robot that is basically his only lasting connection to his deceased brother and says "bring the pain." Not only that, Hiro co-opts Tadashi's old friends, who likewise have incredibly useful research of their own and they all decide, being a superhero is more fun.

As you can imagine the lesson of the movie morphs into "revenge is bad, let go of your pain," but the superhero theatrics and the lack of resolution when it comes to Hiro returning to the University just takes away from actual friggin' heroes i.e. engineers. Engineers are people who dedicate their lives to inventing and improving on technology that actually benefits mankind. Leave it to Disney to completely ignore that aspect of the story and placates to pre-teens with dreams of one day becoming Batman.

8. Wanted (2008)
Speaking of pedantic wish fulfillment porn; let's talk about Wanted. In it James McAvoy plays Wesley a desk drone who discovers he has an interesting family history. Like his father before him, he joins a fraternity of assassins who kill based on the weaving of a supernatural loom (odd I know). The loom gives the assassins names of people who would potentially bring harm to the world and therefore must be destroyed. While reluctant at first, Wesley is convinced by the fraternity's leader Sloan (Morgan Freeman) and perfects his special abilities of superhuman strength, speed, and perception.

It's mind-blowing how bad this movie is!

This movie plays around with a hypothetical I'm sure we've all heard, if you had a time machine, would you kill Hitler? It's an interesting topic which unfortunately is completely undone by director Timur Bekmambetov. Have you never heard of him; just think Russian Michael Bay and that pretty much sums up his filmography which also includes Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012). His frenetic, dynamic camerawork and distracting over-reliance on CG-effects is so incredibly annoying that it's nearly impossible to enjoy this movie. Even with the inclusion of Angelina Jolie, Common, Terence Stamp and Chris Pratt the entire thing falls flatter than a Waffle House pancake.

Is this Shakespeare or a Sublime album cover?

7. Romeo + Juliet (1996)
I promised myself only one Baz Luhrmann film and while Moulin Rouge! (2001) is more popular I despise Romeo + Juliet just a smidgen more. Part of it has to do with Hollywood's insistence that they modernize Shakespeare to unabashedly pander to the MTV generation but mostly it's the frenzied, hyper-delirious, hyper-hectic, hyper-hyper editing that can make any unwitting audience member fall into an epileptic seizure. While never updating the dialogue, Luhrmann decides to trim the fat of the play by allowing no one to enter or exeunt in any scene ever. Instead they say their lines and we cut to the regular progression of the play without any understanding of time or the space.

What's wrong with that exactly? Well concentrating every dose of drama without defusing the tension or allowing the material to breathe insures that nothing and I mean nothing sticks with you after the credits roll. For example, Leonardo DiCaprio's overwrought reaction to Mercutio's death is immediately followed by Claire Danes singing a tune and laying in bed. There's no context or dramatic pause, just members of the audience relieving their own tension with unintended laughter. Romeo + Juliet isn't a movie; it's a race to the finish line. It's a huckster trying to sell you something with you not realizing until it's too late, it's something you can live without.

Ferris Bueller: doing stupid things while driving before cellphones

6. Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)
The eighties wasn't a very good decade for popular teen movies; There I said it. We look on with rose-colored glasses at the works of John Hughes but even his seminal classic The Breakfast Club (1985) has aged into a listless melodrama. Still, I have reverence for the man. He did give a voice to teens when no one else was really engaging them. Yet despite this Ferris Bueller's Day Off I simply cannot give a pass to. Those who remember my Muddled Movie Morals article will know that my hatred for this movie has gone back quite a ways. Here's the excerpt from that article:

Ferris Bueller (Matthew Broderick) is probably one of the most gleefully egocentric main characters to ever exist in mainstream cinema. On the surface, Ferris is just a upper middle-class white boy who wants to have some fun. Nothing wrong so far except the fact that he's a psychopath. What really gets to me is his complete disregard for his friends; his lady Sloane (Mia Sara) and the deathly ill Cameron (Alan Ruck).

The day starts after Ferris pretends to be sick then calls Cameron who is at home bedridden. He doesn't want to go on an excursion which is reasonable given the fact he's white as a sheet, but Ferris basically bullies him into not only going, but boosting his dad's prized Ferrari. Sloane (yeah I didn't know that was her name either) is a bit more willing but certainly didn't have plans to skip school on that fateful day. She was likely shoehorned at the last minute because Cameron was too much of a damp towel to let loose in Chicago. You basically know the rest of the story, they go to the city, con their way into a four star restaurant, ruin a parade, total the car and Ferris gets away with everything. So the lesson is essentially, its okay to run amok and treat your friends like s**t; so long as you have a good time doing it.

5. Kingsman: The Secret Service (2014)
Kingman: The Secret Service is the story of a British hood named Eggsy (Taron Egerton) who is given the chance to prove his mettle as a member of an elite secret service organization. Colin Firth plays his mentor (codename: Galahad) because years ago Eggsy's father saved his life during a mission. While Eggsy is in training, an eccentric tech billionaire (Samuel L. Jackson) is in the final stages of his nefarious plan to stop global warming. Can the Kingmen stop him before he submerges the world in chaos?

Kingman is an overloaded male fantasy with a fatalistic view of human behavior and an insultingly out of touch, Anglos-know-best mentality. The action, while occasionally cool to look at, can't hide its hatred filled heart and its attempts at parody of the James Bond Series are, at the very most half-assed. Everyone seems to ignore the fact that if the events of the movie transpired, most of the world's leaders would be dead as would, like maybe a fourth of humanity. Yet all people ever seem to know or care about is the fact that they're coming up with a sequel. Oh please, dear God no!

Please no! Make it stop!

4. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)
I make no secret of my distaste for horror movies. It's really a lose-lose in my book, either they don't scare me and I hate it because it didn't live up to its promise or, I am scared and I hate it because I don't like to be frightened. That said, I do watch some of the "classics" and always manage to find a few scenes I enjoy. Not so in the case of Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

The movie takes it's time to build, providing a passable pod of teenage characters we care for more than your average teen-slasher flick. Problem is all of them are terrible actors, I mean truly abysmal. Then within a single fifteen minute time-frame all but one are, well, massacred. Then we are left with Marilyn Burns whimpering while the sounds of animals bleat before their demise. The family perpetrating the massacre look on with excitement.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre marks the first time the feeling of disgust was purposely added into a movie with reckless abandon and in that regard the movie is an unbridled success. Yet even for using so little actual blood, the movie was just a foul experience worthy of a post-cinema house shower. With today's blood-filled shock horror dominating every corner of the genre, Texas Chainsaw Massacre is quite frankly too tame for today's audience, worthy only of a look-see to those who take the history of horror seriously.

3. Madagascar (2005)

Most movies have an inner logic to them that dictates the progression of the plot. Even movies with a man in a flying suit of iron and another in star-spangled spandex can't help but at least try to make sense to the public. That's why movies like the Madagascar movies (2005-2014) are so bloody annoying! They break the rules of their own inner logic so many times that you might as well just give up on paying attention and let the stupid sink in. There are plenty of examples though the most egregious involves Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted (2012). In it, the principle animals, who mind you are still struggling to get back to New York City, make it from the Serengeti to Monaco in a single screen dissolve. No explanation on how they got through the Sahara or the Mediterranean Sea.

Answer to everything...snorkels

The first one, while not as ambitious as the others is still a grand waste of time. In it the animals are stuck on the island of Madagascar surrounded by lemurs. The villains are a pack of wild felines who do absolutely nothing of consequence and the character resolution of Alex the lion (Ben Stiller) is so patently lazy that you hardly need to bother. Who knew that a movie with such an interesting premise could ultimately lead to the moral: don't eat your friends. Good job movie, good job.

2. Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007)
Yes it's Johnny Depp once again teaming up with Tim Burton. Yes it's atmospheric and brooding like the goth kids in high school who used to smoke beneath the Football stadium bleachers. Yes it's got a great performance by the late great Alan Rickman. Here's a question for fans though; do you remember a single song from the soundtrack? Seriously, even the underwhelming Princess and the Frog (2009) had a few good tunes that stick with you; not so much with Sweeney Todd.

Sondheim-ize the crap out of the audience!

Sweeney Todd on stage is notoriously hard for professional singers. First it has the longevity of an opera yet the strong muscular tones of a Broadway show. There are a lot of leitmotifs throughout the movies and there are a lot of very interesting discords. I'm not knocking it, it's just very un-commercial to take this many risks with your material so you should probably get some great singers to pull it off. Unfortunately Johnny Depp and Alan Rickman are terrible singers. Helena Bonham Carter and Sacha Baron Cohen fair a little better but in reality no one and I mean no one can capture the fidelity Sondheim would have been looking for.

HAHAHAHAHA (facepalm)

1. Step Brothers (2008)
Seriously people, can we stop thinking Will Ferrell movies are funny? He made one good anarchistic comedy in 2004 and has since milked his Anchorman (2004) success into a cottage industry of utterly pointless low-brow comedies. More often than not Will Ferrell comedies seem to forget that the reason dialogue is funny is not because the words sound goofy but because whoever said them is a goof. The step-brothers in Step Brothers aren't funny, they're not interesting nor people we should root for; they're mean and stupid. The victims of their insufferable stupidity don't deserve them as a part of their lives; not the mother, not the father, not the annoying "grownup" step-brother with his seemingly perfect family.

I'm far from a prude too, I like vulgarity if it serves a purpose but in Step Brothers it's just there like a fox in a hen house. This movie is just a collection of mean taunts and ridiculously broad improv setups meant to be quoted by neanderthals by the company water-cooler (no doubt to block the realization that their own meaninglessness is a farce). If you want to watch a good movie with a similar conceit watch What About Bob? (1991), or Orange County (2002) or better yet just put a bucket over your head and have someone strike it repeatedly with a hammer. I'm sorry, was that too mean; so is Step Brothers!

Boy and the World

Year: 2013
Genre: Animated Adventure
Directed: Ale Abreu
Stars: Vinicius Garcia, Felipe Zilse, Ale Abreu, Lu Horta, Marco Aurelio Campos
Production: GKids

Decades behind a computer, toiling and tinkering with the programming and software has given us the near-photographic realism of CGI animation. The culmination of which is the film Inside Out (2015) which is poised to win the Best Animated Feature Oscar at the end of the month. Yet as anyone who truly loves animation will know, it's not about who has the most detailed techniques or the most expensive equipment. With great ideas and simple yet sublime stories, something as lo-fi as Boy and the World can move its audience to the core.

The story begins with a young boy (Garcia) who lives in a rural abode near the jungle. His father (Campos), a mustached man sporting a straw hat and a flute, grabs a suitcase and heads to the city. the boy is heartbroken by his father's sudden absence and decides to head to the city to find him. On his odyssey he meets a host of colorful characters and comes face to face with the seductiveness, absurdity and danger of modern life.

The animation is reminiscent of the work of Don Hertzfeldt. Everything is cobbled together with simple geometric shapes and seemingly done in charcoal and crayon. Yet unlike Hertzfeldt's work there isn't a sense of ruing existential doom; at its heart it is innately humanistic. Its simplicity and kaleidoscopic vision immediately strikes you with a sense of childlike wonder and as things in the story become more complex it washes over you in a flood of emotion and awe. The color palette in this film is so effective in rendering the wonder of the jungle, the bustling of the city and the rainbow-tinged weaving's of the Mestizo people that parade down the streets.

It's important to note that the movie is largely non-verbal. What is uttered is dubbed in backward Portuguese and the only guiding light you're given are the visuals and the soundtrack. And what a neat soundtrack it is! Grupo Experimental de Musica (GEM), Emicida, Nana Vasconcelos and the Bushdancers all somewhat obscure Brazilian bands that help the story gently flow through you. Not since the early work of Hayao Miyazaki has there been a more genuine work of youthful artistic expression and such a full spectrum of unfettered emotion.

A movie so deceptively simple and yet so emotionally complex comes around only once every few years, and an animation of this caliber comes round perhaps once in a generation. Some may not be hard won by it's environmental overtones and be contrarian to its thoughts on consumerism yet there's no denying that a story this human deserves attention and praise. Blink and you'll miss this little gem but if you can find it in theaters or (hopefully soon) on Netflix, I highly recommend it.

Final Grade: A-

Chronicle

Year: 2012
Genre: Sci-Fi Action/Found Footage
Directed: Josh Trank
Stars: Dane DeHaan, Alex Russell, Michael B. Jordan, Michael Kelly, Ashley Hinshaw, Bo Petersen, Anna Wood
Production: 20th Century Fox

Like many of you, I gleamed at the trailer and poster with a heavy amount of skepticism. "Yet another superhero-esque film" I thought, this time brought to the screen with the increasingly hawkeyed hand-held style. Is this really necessary? Well no, its not, but its a lot of fun.

The plot you can decipher from the trailer; three teenagers, Andrew, Steve and Matt find a hole in the ground and uncover something that gives them the power to move things with their minds. Then they act as any normal teenager would if suddenly given superpowers, they goof off. Things however get murky when Andrew (Dane DeHaan) begins lashing out as his broken family life becomes too much for him to bare. Actors Michael B. Jordan and Alex Russell complete the triptych as the local high school's popular kid and Andrew's too-cool-for-school cousin.

Capturing teenage angst on film has always seemed like a real struggle for Hollywood. Common knowledge dictates that if you faced the camera towards a group of well groomed twenty-somethings and relegated them to a particular clique it'll all work out. Yet "Chronicle's" script expands on that world without making it "the film". Steve is popular because he is genuinely a sociable guy not because he's some feckless ladder climber. On the flip-side of the coin, Andrew is withdrawn and anti-social because his mother is ill and his father is an alcoholic with a rage problem. These are very real issues that are glossed over or ignored in average teen movies.

But this isn't just a coming-of-age tale, its also a showcase for emerging talents, director Josh Trank and screenwriter Max Landis. While some of the camera tricks and dialogue may seem contrived at times there's no denying their boundless creativity. Trank breathes new life into the 'Blair Witch' gimmick taking "footage" from a wide array of hand-held gadgetry to create a pretty convincing collage, or dare I say chronicle.

As the three climb into the hole to investigate one of them makes a reference to Plato's allegory of the cave. Perhaps a quote from 'Alice in Wonderland' would have been more apt. Like Alice all three are young, surprisingly accepting of the situation and about to enter a world where the natural laws of physics need not apply.

Final Grade: B-

Call Northside 777

Year: 1948
Genre: True-Crime
Directed: Henry Hathaway
Stars: James Stewart, Richard Conte, Lee J. Cobb, Helen Walker, Betty Garde, Kasia Orzazewski, Joanne De Bergh, John McIntire, Howard Smith
Production: 20th Century Fox

Call Northside 777 is one of those movies that probably created a bit of a row when it was released in the cinemas of Chicago in 1948. It's the type of movie those old enough to remember the 40's and lived in the City with big shoulders would no doubt look upon fondly like many who remember the 80's look at Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986). It was, after all, the first movie to be shot on location in Chicago and features the iconic Merchandise Mart along the river as well as interiors of the Chicago Times building. As an adopted son of the Windy City, I found the city added a certain je ne sais quoi; a feeling that I can't quite describe yet brought depth to the story.

Not the official movie of Chicago! Stop thinking that!

It does help that the story begins with a brief historical narration; first of the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, then Chicago's most dangerous period, prohibition. Thus the plot unravels within that context. A speakeasy owned by a Polish immigrant (Garde) is robbed at gunpoint by two masked men. In the chaos a police officer is killed and days later, two men are arrested claiming innocence. One of them, Frank Wiecek (Conte) cannot recall his whereabouts on the day of the shooting and is sentenced to 99 years in prison. Ten years have passed before reporter P.J. McNeal (Stewart) is assigned to investigate the case further. The reason for the investigation; in desperation Wiecek's mother (Orzazewski) placed an ad for a $5,000 reward for information on the case. She saved that money by scrubbing floors. McNeal is at first reluctant but as he digs deeper he realizes a major injustice has indeed occurred.

While categorized as a film noir by some, Call Northside 777 is much less stylized, approaching the subject with the earthy realism of a docudrama. It's a gamble to be sure considering on-location shooting and deconstructed noirs were a new popular innovation. Jules Dassin would use a similar technique in The Naked City (1948) later that year transplanting Chicago with New York City. Hitchcock would then master this delicate balance between realism and true-crime with The Wrong Man (1956) which is a masters course in art imitating true life.

Call Northside 777 Is not an absolute masterpiece but it is a superb little gem about intrepid news reporting. James Stewart has always been a reliable source of trustworthiness, idealism and grit thus his character is perfectly on point. The real show-stopper however is Lee J. Cobb whose blustering Chicago Times editor Brian Kelly (based on real editor Karin Walsh) is the balance between practical and cynical that we need to keep the story from falling into abject moral-ism. He's much more subtle then in 12 Angry Men (1957); I'd say Call Northside 777 is edged out only by On the Waterfront (1954) as his best performance.

While a little dated, Call Northside 777 is nevertheless an interesting film worthy of a watch or re-watch if you're so inclined. It features a strong true-to-life story about a man falsely convicted of murder and a reporter willing to stake his reputation on the man's innocence. Furthermore it is a story of a city that can be as cruel as it is mighty and majestic. For me, it was a reminder on how much things can change given time; One minute there's a speakeasy on Ashland Ave. the next there's an American Apparel. Or to put it in more salient terms; one minute you're proven guilty, the next you're given a second chance.

Final Grade: C+