The Land

Year: 2016
Genre: Drama
Directed: Steven Caple Jr.
Stars: Jorge Lendeborg Jr., Moises Arias, Rafi Gavron, Ezri Walker, Machine Gun Kelly, Robert Hunter, Melvin Gregg, Kim Coates, Nadia Simms, Ashleigh Morghan, Erykah Badu, Tom Kondilas
Production: Low Sparks Films

The Land ranks up there with Enough (2002) and The Town (2010) as the least helpful, least effective titles in recent memory. Its a shame too because the film's well-worn narrative and cautiously on-the-nose themes are enough for most people to dismiss it whole-cloth. It's just another urban, coming-of-age drama hoping to capitalize on white liberal guilt and likely to be picked up and syndicated on IFC, they'll say. Yet there's something more than meets the eye about this film's uncompromising bleakness and belabored, intricate nodus. A none-to-immersive realism that speckles the screen with an understated fervor. We're not convinced these characters are real, but writer/director Steven Caple Jr. thinks they are. It's surprising how much mileage one can get out of that alone.

The Land centers on four chronically truant youths Patty Cake (Gavron), Boobie (Walker), Junior (Arias) and Cisco (Lendeborg) during their summer vacation. The four hope to escape their unforgiving neighborhood streets and third track expectations by stealing cars and raising enough cash to support a professional skateboarding career. By doing so however, they cross paths with one of Cleveland's most powerful drug syndicates and sink slowly into a life that may be too crooked for them to handle.

The Land follows all the similar story beats we have all come to expect, ever since Boyz n the Hood (1991) became an unexpected success. On the surface, the choices of our heroes are always clear in their truth and consequence, yet for whatever reason they're always stuck making the wrong choices at the wrong time. It can be cumbersome and by the third act it becomes wholly predictable. What an invested audience will see however is a slow motion car crash, where we know where all these little decisions are leading to, but are powerless to stop them.

That feeling of powerlessness permeates The Land, giving some a cause for contemplation. Even when the kids are goofing off, skating through blighted streets and abandoned school houses, you can just feel the tension; like the sudden woosh of air before a hammer drops. Cisco, the presumed leader of the gang insists "I don't want anyone to control me,"yet it's clear that he's being constantly molded, manipulated and controlled by an environment that's openly hostile towards him. That environment, by the way includes a manic Kim Coates whose crusty Uncle Steve would be considered Dickensian if he wasn't so outwardly pathetic. Between his uncle's ramshackle Hot Dog stand and his cousin Junior's house, Cisco gets the strong impression he's just another lost cause.

Seriously though, this is like the exact same movie...

What puts The Land just a hair above the average helping of faux-realist poverty porn is Caple's often poetic inclusion of Cleveland a not just a setting but a character in the film. Large portions of the film cast the city in eternal midnight; a Gothic harbinger of sorts. Yet when the four start selling large quantities of "Molly" to transient party-goers, the city opens up with predatory proficiency. The buses and Rapid Transit System are but mucky arteries, the buildings: a facade of wealth and wellness; the carnival hints at possible pleasures - yet it's all a lie.

While many films blunt their stories with overdone melodrama or social proselytizing, The Land dares to be bleak, telling a distressing story about the cyclical, cross-generational nature of political and economic violence. Taught to either accept vocational education for jobs that no longer exist, or live a short-lived life of wild despotism, these kids are never really given a chance. In a quest for self-determination, our crew all ultimately become servants of a larger master. It's the audience's embarras de choix as to whether any of them made the right choices.

Final Grade: C+

Don't Breathe

Year: 2016

Genre: Horror

Directed: Fede Alvarez

Stars: Jane Levy, Stephen Lang, Dylan Minnette, Daniel Zovatto, Emma Bercovici, Franciska Torocsik, Christian Zagia, Katia Bokor, Sergej Onopko

Production: Ghost House Pictures

Don't Breathe builds its tension the hard way. Instead of relying solely on jump scares and gore, the film consistently paints itself and its characters into a corner then creatively gets them out of a bad situation while being both unexpected and completely organic. It's a hard high-wire act and one that you'd think a genre director like Fede Alvarez would stumble on. Yet Don't Breathe not only continues the Hitchcockian chamber-piece Renaissance kicked off by Disturbia (2007), it runs away with it. It artfully repackages old-fashioned thrills and kills it with a third act that's ominous but earned.

Don't Breathe concerns the exploits of three white-trash miscreants named Rocky (Levy), Alex (Minnette) and Money (Zovatto). They live in post-bankruptcy Detroit, because horror producers find the scene of boarded up houses, blighted streets and deserted neighborhoods far too spooky to pass up. Plus with the average time for emergency response being 41 minutes, the pesky instinct to call the cops is left completely off the table. The trio are banking on this, in addition to Alex's family ties to a security company to rob houses with impunity. With one more score under their belts, Rocky and Money hope to move to California and escape their life of rust-belt entropy. Their target, a blind shut-in (Lang) whose recent court settlement made him a crotchety late-life millionaire. What the would-be thieves don't expect however is for their target to be so resourceful and so deadly.

Anyone familiar with Stephen Lang's filmography would know that the man has a long history of playing the grizzled tough guy and Don't Breathe's unnamed Blind Man is no exception. Despite having a little over ten lines and spending a large portion of the film wondering with arms out, he dominates the frame with muted bellicose. He's scary not only because he's a brutal close-range brawler but because his disability reminds us that he's still human. A human whose life has descended into a Nietzschean perversion - "Man can do anything, once he knows there is no God," he says in a moment of well-earned shock and disgust. 

When his humanity is questioned, in a second act reveal that steadily raises the stakes, our sympathies then ricochets back to our trio. Up until this point, were given the average wafer-thin backstories girdled with teenage neglect, alpha-male shows of dominance and unrequited love. Yet as the Blind Man becomes more invested in their demise and their routes for escape become limited, we as the audience feel for our teenage lambs; if for no other reason than we're right there with them. 

I won't go as far as to say, the characters have become fully formed by the time the credits roll, but I do admire their resourcefulness throughout. They deal with the claustrophobia of their plight with sharper and sharper fight or flight instincts complimented with masterful cinematography by Pedro Luque. His camerawork allows the audience to truly immerse themselves in the space, keeping us glued to not only the characters but what their seeing...and more importantly what they're not seeing.

If there's a spiritual grandfather to Don't Breathe it's almost certainly Alfred Hitchcock's Rope (1948). Not only is the cinematography eerily similar but so are the themes which parities feeling of superiority (in this case moral not intellectual) with the banality of evil. 10 Cloverfield Lane (2016) may have been this year's torchbearer for the old master's brand of suspense thus far this year but I'm going to go ahead and say its reign has been short-lived. Don't Breathe - don't miss.

Final Grade: B-

Equity

Year: 2016
Genre: Drama
Directed: Meera Menon
Stars: Anna Gunn, James Purefoy, Sarah Megan Thomas, Alysia Reiner, Craig Bierko, Margaret Colin, Nate Corddry, Nick Gehlfuss, Carrie Preston, Samuel Roukin, Tracie Thoms, Lee Tergesen
Production: Broad Street Pictures

When Breaking Bad (2008-2013) ended after an impressive run of unprecedented critical and cultural acclaim, something seemed to have been lost in the post-mourning debrief. Brewing since season 2, throngs of fans came forward to proclaim Anna Gunn's Skyler White as among the most hated characters on TV ever. It got so bad that Gunn even wrote an op-ed in the New York Times defending Skyler. "I'm concerned that so many people react to Skyler with such venom. Could it be that they can't stand a woman who won't suffer silently or "stand by her man"? That they despise her because she won't back down or give up? Or because she is, in fact, Walter's equal?" she wrote.

I for one was a big fan of Skyler, as I was of all the familiar heroes and villains on that show. Her shrewish wife turned dark and corrupted equal was the kind of complex character arc as to be expected from the "best show on TV."

Naomi Bishop (Gunn) isn't corruptible in the first moments of Equity; she's already an insatiable crook. "I like money - like knowing I have it," she says with a Gordon Gekko matter-of-factness. Given her job, a Senior Investment Banker to a large firm, loving money is probably a prerequisite. Yet associates and CEOs looking to make their companies public agree, her ambition and cold demeanor "...rubs people the wrong way." Much like Skyler, Naomi is put in an impossible scenario, trying to make money for her bosses while unwilling to conform to certain expectations i.e. be motherly or coquettish. Its clear without it being explicit - no man would be put in her shoes.

Yet Equity is not a provocation, it tells the story straight, leaving the gender politics where it should be: in the analysis where it can cause more disruption. What we have instead is a high-stakes game of Russian roulette told with the same discursive simmer as Michael Clayton (2007). While some may find this tact prosaic, there's no doubting it feels real. Plus with the help of Naomi's hubris, we see the Jenga tower of her life weaken and teeter; much like any well made character study.

Helping in her demise are fellow women Erin (Thomas) and Samantha (Reiner). Unlike Naomi, Erin has long conformed to expectations and wears herself with a composed flirtatiousness that investors find reassuring. Her inner conflict, much like her outward appearance is showy but shallow in a "women can't have everything" kind of way. You'd think with screen time so evenly divided among Erin and Naomi, she'd be more interesting, but her moments only make the audience aware of how sluggish the editing is.

Samantha likewise creates a lot of grief for Naomi though thankfully none for the film. Samantha works for the District Attorneys Office and confidently sets her white-collar crime sniffing snout on Naomi's main squeeze, Michael Connor (Purefoy). Not only does she prove resourceful in a pinch, Samantha's natural likability proves an asset when she occasionally reveals too much. If she were the lead on a CBS police procedural, I'd watch.

Well, I was kinda close.

The men of Equity fair just as well as supporting cast. James Purefoy exudes a certain smiley, understated nihilism while Craig Bierko is perfectly smarmy as Michael's hedge fund friend Benji. On the other hand poor Nate Corddry seems destined to play the helpless, baby-faced rube from now until he's old enough to play the suspect on Law and Order (1990-2010) spin-offs. He's okay I suppose but in a tank full of sharks, he's a bit of a guppy.

Take that Margin Call (2011)!!!

Equity is, when all is said and done, an actor's showcase for the refined Anna Gunn who not only leans into her unapologetic tigress routine but hints at deeper instincts and talents. Additionally, Equity is also a good movie written and directed by women, about women and for women. Its mere existence is an attack on patriarchy but not the full frontal kind. The kind that sneaks through the back door and right before slicing throats in the night says, "I'm better than you."

Final Grade: B

Hell or High Water

Year: 2016
Genre: Western
Directed: David Mackenzie
Stars: Chris Pine, Ben Foster, Jeff Bridges, Gil Birmingham, Katy Mixon, Dale Dickey, Christopher W. Garcia, Kevin Rankin, Melanie Papalia, Keith Meriweather, Kristin Berg, Jackamoe Buzzell
Production: CBS Films

The people that populate the world of Hell or High Water seem to stand at attention and out of time. They sit at the corner booth of their favorite diner sporting white gallon hats and speed through one horse towns on the way to the only profitable business; the local liquor store. It's a solemn austere existence; one reminiscent of Sam the Lion's in The Last Picture Show (1971). Yet there is no false hope to be had here. The ghosts of the past are long gone. The only thing left amid the boarded up downtowns and clearing fires is the possibility of bequeathal.

That is the basic idea brothers Toby (Pine) and Tanner Howard (Foster) have when they first don their ski masks and head for the nearest Midland Bank. Their scheme is remarkable in its simplicity; steal only from the cashier drawers, $20's, $50's, loose change; whatever they collect, they launder through the nearby Comanche Reservation Casino. The ultimate goal is to save their family farm. Seems ever since oil has been discovered on their turf, the bank has been just itching to foreclose and with the death of their mother, the second mortgage has become unsurmountable.

Much of the film was shot in and around the panhandle plains of west Texas. The camera's fixation on big sky and barren grazing land appeals to our inner-cowpoke.  Yet Hell or High Water is closer in spirit to Hud (1963) or Lonely Are the Brave (1962) than the high stake and higher implausibilities of The Searchers (1956). The stark small town blight litters the plains like pools of runoff and while the people talk the Big Jake talk, they mostly come across like the townsfolk of Cold Turkey (1971).

I'll gladly shoot at them until they shoot back!

Even Toby seems inclined to cut and run at the first sign of trouble. Every tension building chance of capture brings with it the possibility that Toby may just loose his cool, just may catch himself in a lie, just may fold. Yet something keeps him there, shotgun loaded, robbing banks with his older brother. Call it a moral imperative, his family is on their last legs financially and he has two sons to support, but in a sense he's also keeping the spirit of Texas alive by acting like Billy the Kid.

Yet every Billy the Kid must have a Pat Garrett and for that we have the ambulant and ever jaded Texas Ranger Marcus Hamilton (Bridges). Set to retire wrapped around a leather Barcalounger, Hamilton jumps at a chance to hunt "them two boys down," going so far as to stake out a bank they're fated to hit. Jeff Bridges brings all the gravitas an actor of his caliber does to this remarkably modest film. He brings unexpected mirth to Hamilton whose shrewd investigations and causal bigotry have a ring of west Texas authenticity and twangy cheer.

If ever there was an actor best suited for this film however it's Ben Foster as the older, more criminal minded Tanner. He blissfully antagonizes everyone he meets, fancying himself a Comanche: lord of the plains and enemy to all. The only person he shows love for is his brother which proves his most enigmatic quality. Living his life in and out of prison can harden a man, even to the embrace of long suffering family. Yet when asked "why did you agree to do this with me then?" Tanner responds "Because you asked me to little brother," without skipping a beat.

Hell or High Water is a modest, under-the-radar crime drama told confidently and brilliantly by director David Mackenzie. It is at once a composite of Robin Hood crime drama and elegy westerns and an example of seamless top-to-bottom storytelling. While Hell or High Water comes from well-worn traditions, it is exceedingly rare to see a film of this caliber. Like the people who populate the film, it simply stands out of time.

Final Grade: A-

Southside with You

Year: 2016
Genre: Drama
Directed: Richard Tanne
Stars: Tika Sumpter, Parker Sawyers, Taylar Fondren, Preston Tate Jr., Donald Paul, Angel Knight, Tony E. Brown, Vanessa Bell Calloway, Deborah Geffner, Donn C. Harper, Jerod Haynes, Tom McElroy
Production: Roadside Attractions

The benefit of making a biographical film about a long deceased statesman or woman is we can lionize them at will without having the propensity of sounding political. Young Mr. Lincoln (1939), Wilson (1944), John Adams (2008) all concerned themselves with figures that were long-gone and if controversy was to be had it was a low murmur at best. On the opposite side of the spectrum there are the maladroit political screeds. Your Iron Lady's (2011) and Primary Color's (1998); movies which are to varying degrees satirical admonishments and ad hominum attacks.

Exhibit W.

Southside with You covers a third category which is exceedingly rare, especially in today's culture of "kill your Gods". The film takes place over a day in the life of a young Michelle Robinson (Sumpter) and a young Barack Obama (Sawyers) as they go on a first date. During their courtship they take in a community organizing event, an art exhibit, multiple walks through the park and a movie. While doing so they get to know about each other and plow through their insecurities, their family lives and their plans for the future. That's basically it; our first film fictionalization of President Barack Obama is not some big epic nor a under-the-radar satire. No, this film is basically Before Sunrise (1995) without the sexual tension.

Presidential material right here!

As our two leads, Tika Sumpter and Parker Sawyers are dead-ringers to the current occupants of the White House; down to their mannerisms, speech patterns and general way about them. As actors they are both reliably charming, have great chemistry together and evoke sympathy with very little coaxing. I genuinely felt compassion for these characters and the layers of social and emotional pressures they face.

Which is just as well because the script is about as heavy-handed and clunky as a Sunday school sermon. Within the first five minutes we know that we're going to spend our time with interesting people because their resumes were pretty much announced like they were on a dating show. Here's Michelle Robinson who matriculated from Princeton before getting her Junior Doctorates from Harvard Law. Her brother is a basketball coach at Brown and her dad has MS. Young Barack is a young summer associate who is going to Harvard Law and was born in Hawaii. He briefly worked as a Gardens community organizer while going to Columbia and for a young man he's surprisingly well traveled. He likes pie and hates ice cream.

Bingo!

As they get to know each other, the poorly concealed wounds of an absent father and a bi-racial upbringing keep the drama alive though for the most part writer/director Richard Tanne goes through great pains to make Obama look like the patron Saint of Chicago's southside. Granted even terrible people put their best foot forward when on a first date but man this guy lays it on thick. Every time Michelle meets one of his friends they keep nudging her and saying "he's a keeper". She replies "We're not dating," because of course she would. Cue the heartfelt speech about working together and not judging people before you get to know them; and kiss in three, two...

Now apparently a lot of the events of the film are true to life. Barack Obama was a summer associate at the law firm Michelle was working at and Michelle did initially refuse to go on a date with him. They did in-fact see Do the Right Thing (1989) and did in-fact go get Baskin Robbins afterward. Yet if these two characters were purely fictional, chances are you'd be bored out of your mind watching this movie. If ever there was an example of a true story that isn't interesting enough to be a movie, this is clearly it; especially given the "will they or won't they" tension that actually makes movies like these bearable is absent.

Southside with You is an innocent, easily digestible and easily forgettable puff piece on the level of a Teen Beat article asking Sasha who her favorite One Direction member is. That in itself is not the worst thing in the world, but given that the real life Obama is still a lightning rod of controversy, this film is quite the letdown by comparison.

Final Grade: D

The Fall

Year: 2006
Genre: Fantasy
Directed: Tarsem Singh
Stars: Lee Pace, Catinca Untaru, Justine Waddell, Daniel Caltagirone, Marcus Wesley, Robin Smith, Jeetu Verma, Kim Uylenbroek, Leo Bill, Emil Hostina, Julian Bleach, Ronald France
Production: Absolute Entertainment

I will make a bold prediction. By the end of director Tarsem Singh's career, he will make at least one great film. One film that will not only be visually resplendent but a critical masterpiece worthy of immortality. One film which will be lovingly fawned over and studied like it were a chiseled Roman statue or a carefully cobbled mosaic. One movie that will invariably label the director ahead of his time and color his earlier films gems unrealized by contemporary audiences.

Pretension, thy name is Tarsem.

Why do I think this? Well despite all of his films being overly indulgent garbage, it's the kind of overly indulgent garbage that critics and academics trying desperately to seem smart will automatically gravitate towards. In a visual medium, Singh is a visual thinker and has the dexterity and technical know-how to create a truly unforgettable tableaux from frame to frame. Yet he's never the original scribe of his own films projects and depends too much on sloppy editing. These choices harpoon his ambitions and sabotage any real chance his films have to surmount their other minor problems.

Take The Fall for example. The plot of the film revolves around an injured, possibly paralyzed stuntman who befriends an innocent little girl while wasting away on a hospital bed. Roy (Pace) manipulates Alexandria (Untaru) into smuggling morphine for him so he can end his life. He tries to accomplish this by telling a nebulous fairy-tale to keep the young girl entertained as she herself recovers from a broken arm. In the fairy-tale a gallery of rogues are all seeking revenge on a nefarious regional governor who has wronged them all in some way.

Every once in a while, a list will worm its way out of cyberspace, enumerating history's most visually impressive films. The Fall seems to always appear as a special mention and with good reason. The striking natural vistas and pre-industrial urbanity that Singh captures over a rumored four year shooting schedule are simply breathtaking. Not a single set was built in service of The Fall. Instead Singh shot the film in 28 different countries and searched for the most surreal, mystical and colorful places on the globe, scouring the blue city-scape of Jodhpur, the reefs of Fiji and the deserts of Namibia for the perfect shot. The travel was not in vain either. Anyone impressed by the sleek green-screen produced mayhem of this year's Jungle Book (2016) should give The Fall a look then stick their head in a bucket of cold water.

Yet even the least discerning of movie viewers will shift in their seats in dismay over the wooden dialogue and boring characters. The story of the stuntman and the little girl aches from the pains of a cliched story made empty and hollow. This is despite the young Catinca Untaru aptly balancing loquaciousness with curiosity in a way few child actresses reasonably can. The story within the story is likewise airless and hollow suffocating the grandeur of the film like dead air on the radio. Lee Pace as a narrator doesn't help things, lacing his tall tale with a deadpan delivery so simpering and pathetic that it can vicariously make any audience miserable.

The screenplay written by Dan Gilroy and Nico Soultanakis preens with the pretentious, preachy quality of an Oliver Stone film only it doesn't have the luxury of interesting characters. There's an excess of feeling and sweeping, grandiose emotions yet the images paired with dialogue feel like their speaking something important and urgent but in two undecipherable languages.

Ugh, this film.

Tarsem Singh seems to do the impossible with this film, he manages to be both a bore and boorish. Usually the man's intensity and bluster is enough to at least make films like Immortals (2011) and The Cell (2000) interesting (if not unintentionally hilarious); not this time I'm afraid. I wanted to like this film and perhaps in the years to come, The Fall will go through a reevaluation. I suspect it will take Tarsem Singh writing his own screenplay, digging deep into the recesses of his own soul to get a film truly worthy of consideration thus putting his filmography in the limelight. I for one will need a lot of convincing before I give this wannabe Federico Fellini that kind of change of heart. Sorry, being pretty just doesn't cut it.

Final Grade: F

Mechanic: Resurrection

Year: 2016
Genre: Action
Directed: Dennis Gansel
Stars: Jason Statham, Jessica Alba, Sam Hazeldine, Michelle Yeoh, Tommy Lee Jones, John Cenatiempo, Tony Eddington, Femi Elufowoju Jr., Anteo Quintavalle, Yayaying Rhatha Phongam
Production: Millennium Films

Mechanic: Resurrection doesn't need to exist in any way shape or form. Let's get that off the bat right away. In fact, The Mechanic (2011) didn't need to exist, yet like washed up ambergris or a second season of Reaper (2007-2009), it just showed up one day. Now we have another one only this time instead of a grizzled revenge story, this second helping of the sordid life of Arthur Bishop (Statham) involves a soapy romance and a brother against brother story so recycled it might as well be compost.

Bank Managers!

Since last we saw him, Bishop has been keeping a low profile living in a modest yacht off the harbor of Rio de Janiero. That is until an old villain named Crain (Hazeldine) tracks him down and asks him to take out three people and make them look like accidents. To up the ante, Crain uses a cliched do-gooder named Gina (Alba) as a carrot in a plot-line that should have come across calculated but just comes across as silly. With no choice, Bishop's unique set of skills are put to the test, pitting him against some of the most vile humans on the face of the earth.

Now let's face it, a movie like this shouldn't exactly be plot-heavy. What anyone can reasonably expect is some close-quarters brawling, kinetic gun-play, massive explosions and kick-butt one-liners all to the tune to a soundtrack of pure bluster. Plus, given the amount of supervillain flunkys dying horrifically and shooting for s**t, it's pretty much a given the script for this film was in a producer's back-drawer somewhere marked "Arnold Schwarzenegger Vehicles".

Yet Mechanic: Resurrection tries to be so much smarter than it really is. The intricate planning of each of the protagonists marks demands audience attention, painstakingly creating a collage of premeditation. Yet with each passing moment, it becomes clear that Bishop's meticulousness is less a character detail than a plot device; an excuse to be showy for showy's sake. It's like the film is trying to be A Colt is My Passport (1967) but doesn't have the benefit of having anything interesting to say so it just regurgitates something resembling a low-rent Mission: Impossible (1996-2015).

Mechanic: Resurrection writes a check it simply can't cash, providing a-typical action sequences that include a gondola top brawl, a Devil's Island-type prison break and an amphibious assault of a luxury yacht...twice. The shoddiness of the film shows itself most plainly with each successive explosion which look like they were made by Final Cut Pro students for a senior editing project. The supposed showstopper is Jason Statham grappling against the bottom of a penthouse pool, yet while he was dangling there with superhuman swagger one can't help but think, there's got to be a simpler way to do this and for god-sake light the green screen better!

Also this movie has 0% Lisa Kudrow

If fun can be had from Mechanic: Resurrection it's purely unintentional. The fighting choreography is solid though much of its impact is spoiled by flippant gore and rudimentary gun-play. The cliched romance between Bishop and Gina is syrupy enough to coax giggles, that's if the first twenty minutes of their Thai coast courtship doesn't put you to sleep. Finally, while Bishop is painted as a smart, strong and resourceful character, his actions are commonly anything but. He's pretty much like the scimitar wielding thug in Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981); he's flashy sure, but next to any audience member with a brain, he's only fun when he's unceremoniously shot down.

Final Grade: F

Hands of Stone

Year: 2016
Genre: Drama
Directed: Jonathan Jakubowicz
Stars: Edgar Ramirez, Robert De Niro, Ana de Armas, Usher Raymond, Oscar Jaenada, Ruben Blades, Ellen Barkin, Jurnee Smollett-Bell, John Turturro, Drena De Niro, Reg E. Cathey,
Production: Fuego Films

Hands of Stone is a rise, fall and rise again story of famed Panamanian boxer Roberto Duran (Ramirez) who leapt into notoriety in the 70's after his first controversial appearance at Madison Square Gardens. By the time of his retirement in 2002 at the age of 50, he had 199 fights under his belt with 103 wins and four titles as a light weight, welter weight, light middle weight and middle weight. The film however focuses on his relationship with legendary boxing trainer Ray Arcel (De Niro) whose own exploits in the boxing world made him the first trainer to be inducted into the Boxing Hall of Fame.

Doing a movie of this nature, a couple of questions arise. How do you accurately and intimately make a film about the life and times of Roberto Duran who in addition to being a legend was also a legendary pre-fight s**t talker? How can one best encapsulate the real life of a man who at one point was the guiding light of an entire nation yet had enough of an ego to name all of his male heirs Roberto? Finally, how do you do make that movie great while siphoning off of cues and themes from inspirations like Rocky (1976) and Raging Bull (1980)?

The answer is of course you can't; but you can make a half-way decent film out of everything. And that's basically what director Jonathan Jakubowicz and Bob and Harvey Weinstein have done. It plods its course, steadily paces itself, jab at the appropriate emotional moments and ducks from the energy-sucking minutia that episodic plot-lines tend to have in abundance. Robert De Niro is fine as Ray Arcel giving a spry, worthwhile performance in the same ballpark as Billy Sunday in Men of Honor (2000). Likewise Edgar Ramirez hits all the right notes as our beleaguered hero giving the screenplay a much better performance than it honestly deserves. Ana de Armas, Usher Raymond, Ruben Blades, Oscar Jaenada and Ellen Barkin are all very good with Reg E. Cathey giving a very small but showstopping performance as infamous boxing promoter Don King. Heck even the balance of languages (English and Spanish) is respectfully and organically done. If a great film is three great scenes and no bad ones, then Hands of Stone is 50% of the way there.

Southpaw (2015); check it out, it's good.

Yet much like the underrated Southpaw (2015), it also has no pivotal, never forget scenes or iconic lines. The brightly colored barrios of Panama City and the glitzy sparkle of Las Vegas, not to mention the atmospherics of locker rooms inexplicably filled with smoke, don't really leave an impact. Neither do the stakes of Duran's life which, much like Billy Hope's, was and probably still is filled with conflict, inner-turmoil and a pride that manifests in nationalistic fervor. It's a shame too because if the film decided to explore that aspect of Duran's life, i.e. his relationship to Panama and its people, it could have been unique enough to recommend strongly.

Ta-da!

Yet instead, the film doubles down on the "success is ruination" themes picked up by Raging Bull, while kneading out the supposed nobility of a sport in which two grown men beat the crap out of each other. Yet while watching Hands of Stone, I kept hoping they would change up the kinetic, fast-paced editing of the fight sequences with moments that were, say a little more poetic. For those of you who know what I'm insinuating, congratulations you've seen a "great" scene from a "great" movie about boxing.

Still the champion...

The best that can be said about Hands of Stone is it does what it does predictably and well, like a cover band that's been around for years. It's energetic, it's fun to watch, it certainly has talented people who put their heart and soul into the project and it plays all the hits...yet it's not the real thing. Oh well, a tin star still shines, a discount belt still buckles and Hands of Stone is still good. Watch it if you must, otherwise watch Rocky again instead.

Final Grade: C

Essentials: Modern Times

Year: 1936
Genre: Comedy
Directed: Charlie Chaplin
Stars: Charlie Chaplin, Paulette Goddard, Henry Bergman, Tiny Sandford, Chester Conklin, Hank Mann, Stanley Blystone, Al Ernest Garcia, Richard Alexander, Cecil Reynolds, Murdock MacQuarrie
Production: Charles Chaplin Productions

We like to think that comedy has evolved since the time of silent film. We like to think that with the advent of sound and the injection of modern technology in all aspects of film production has made just about everything better. Indeed, it's hard to argue that so much of today's fun and farce just can't exist without a sound mixer and a few boom mics laying around. Ask yourself, if you put The 40-Year-Old Virgin (2005) or The Hangover (2009) on mute, would you really get anything out of it?

Sorta, kinda...

By 1936, sound had long taken the film industry by storm. In fact, if you listen closely to the moment Al Jolson uttered "You ain't heard nothin' yet," in The Jazz Singer (1927), you may have heard the careers of many shattering in earnest. Never has there been a piece of technology so seamlessly adapted to an industry before or since. To name the number of noteworthy films made after 1929 that were silent would be to name perhaps a dozen.

The Jazz Singer (1927)

Yet with this adoption came growing pains. The cumbersome size of the Photokinema sound-on-disc machines and their components meant cameras had to stay bolted down. Actors had to not wonder too far from the mic or worse still, find a way to wear several pounds of bulky microphones under their garments. What once were dreams, stitched together by editing cuts became pale imitations of stage plays. The grammar of film essentially took two steps back.

Seeing this, silent era superstar Charlie Chaplin decided to stem the tide. In 1931, he directed, produced and starred in City Lights, a romantic masterpiece of stagecraft and pantomime that to this day is one of the best examples of the beauty we lost. Seeing the writing on the wall by 1936, Chaplin decided to give the Tramp one last hurrah before retiring the character. One last bow before the tendrils of technology transforms his career into a shadow of its former self.

We'll miss ye...

Modern Times is at once one last bow, one last look at innocence lost and one glorious masterpiece of cinema. In it, Charlie's lovable Tramp struggles to adapt to a modern technological age while causing light-hearted mayhem everywhere he goes. Throughout the film he tries to conform to working as a security guard, a longshoreman, a factory worker, a mechanic etc. yet his peculiarity prevents him from being at a work site for too long. During his struggles he befriends an woman named Ellen (Goddard) who aids him in his quest for fulfilling work. They of course, fall in love in the chaste innocent way that couples did in the films of the time.

Modern Times is infamous, for among other things, a soundtrack that includes the earworm "Smile" composed by Chaplin himself. The most famous cover was crooned by Nat King Cole whose astringent voice had the poorly covered scars of a life harshly lived. "Smile" to Modern Times is perfect; both as a bittersweet anthem and as addition to the American songbook. It perfectly captures the Tramp's uneasy monachopsis while hanging onto a buoyant hope of finding purpose. It's at times sad, at times triumphant but always life-affirming.

Modern Times is also known for large, unique and detail filled comic set-pieces that despite being around for eighty years still coaxes laughter. One after another, these moments capture the absurdities of industrial life no other film does. Whether it be Chaplin toiling over a conveyor belt of widgets or literally being engulfed by a mechanical do-dad, He always has the perfect expression to reaffirm his humanity in the most inhuman of situations. It's pitch-perfect pantomime done by a true master of the craft.

Of course, being the film advertised as "the one where The Tramp speaks," Modern Times does succumb to the encroachment of sound. And unlike in City Lights, Chaplin decides to inject it as part of a large theme as opposed to a target of mockery. The film is book-ended by two moments of sound, the first of which is his factory boss yelling at him through a large projected screen. "Get back to work!" he yells while the Tramp struggles to find a moment of respite. The inclusion of sound as an oppressor, even a personified one is an effective means of identification. Those who have heard the phrase "If you have time to lean, you have time to clean," will no doubt sympathize with Chaplin's character in that particular moment in time.

The second time sound is used, is to affirm Chaplin's Tramp as a unique individual amid a crowd of onlookers. Late in the film, Ellen finds a job for the Tramp at a restaurant as a singing waiter. Right before his debut, he struggles to remember the words of the song he's to sing. He decides to put the lyrics on his detachable cuffs. Invariably, he looses the cuffs and, thinking quickly, begins to sing in gibberish. It's a prank pulled on audiences clamoring for the Tramp to finally speak on screen, yet it's one that's so incongruously Chaplin that one can't help but admire it.

With Chaplin having a hand in every aspect of the film's production, one can write an entire book fawning over the exploits of a genius so ahead of his time, we still feel his influence. Modern Times showcases that genius, filling the celluloid with beauty, pathos, humor and humanity. Years after most of today's contemporary comedies fade into obscurity, those centuries from now will still fondly remember Charlie and his lovable Tramp. I guarantee it.

Final Grade: A