Movie Review: Love and Mercy

Love and Mercy (2015)

PG-13

4.0 Stars out of 5

Director                                Bill Pohlad
Writer                                   Oren Moverman and Michael Alan Lerner
Cinematography                 Robert D. Yeoman
Music                                    Atticus Ross

Elizabeth Banks                  Melinda Ledbetter
Paul Dano                            Brian Wilson (1960’s)
John Cusak                          Brian Wilson (1980’s)
Paul Giamatti                      Dr. Gene Landy
Graham Rogers                  Al Jardine
Kenny Wormald                 Dennis Wilson
Jake Abel                             Mike Love
Brett Davern                       Carl Wilson
Erin Darke                           Marilyn Wilson
Bill Camp                             Murry Wilson

 

The standard bio-pic for musicians is such a tried and true formula: happy obscurity, struggle into early success, rising success/initial drug and/or alcohol abuse, severe substance abuse/faltering career, intervention, relapse or two/decaying career, final redemption and minor career recovery. It happens every time. Well not every time, “Love and Mercy” is the exception that may prove the rule. The Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson’s story as depicted in “Love and Mercy” definitely hews to a different, not necessarily refreshing musical career path. “Love and Mercy” is a definitely different examination of a musician’s life, but it is also most definitely not an easy film to watch. Painful is a much better one word description of Brian Wilson’s musical and personal life.

Director Bill Pohlad and writers Oren Overman and Michael Alan Lerner have written and adapted a screenplay that compares the life of Brian Wilson in the mid-sixties (well played by Paul Dano) when his musical genius was coming into full flower to his life in the mid-eighties (equally well played by John Cusak) when Wilson lived under the complete control of his psychologist, Dr. Eugene Landy (ominously played by Paul Giamatti). During the sequence in the eighties, Brian meets a Cadillac salesperson, Melinda Ledbetter (played by Elizabeth Banks). Cusak portrays Wilson as a very diffident, halting individual, afraid to make any move that would meet with the disapproval of Dr. Landy. His first meeting with Ledbetter is presented in a manner to emphasis his helplessness. She is naturally confused but attracted to him, perhaps because of his evident need. As they become more involved with one another, his mental problems and subservience to Landy becoming increasingly clear. These scenes interspersed with scenes from the sixties are squirm-inducing they are so painful to watch. Cusak’s depictions of Wilson as little more than a husk of a man are heart breaking.

Interleaved with the evolving relationship between Cusak and Banks in the eighties is a second, separate evolution of Brian Wilson, this one as a young man in the sixties. Early in the sixties scenes is a panic attack experienced by Wilson on an airplane. It is but the beginning of a singular path for Brian away from the Beach Boys, his two brothers (Dennis and Carl), cousin (Mike Love) and friend (Al Jardine). Following the panic attack, Brian asks for and receives permission to withdraw from a planned tour in Japan. While the rest of the group is touring, Brian begins an experimental phase in rock music that has been critiqued by music critics as singular. Brian institutes the use of session musicians to create a “sound” that is as instrumental (no pun intended) to the overall musical effect of the group as the lead singer. The movie emphasizes the painstaking and driven manner in which Brian works with various session members, leading them and pointing them in the direction he wants and can hear in his mind; it is as if Pohlad wants the viewing audience to imagine the inner workings of a modern composer, one that might be on a par with any of the various musical geniuses down through recent history. A priori, I would have thought depicting this process would be as uninvolving as watching someone write a letter, but in fact Pohlad achieves this film’s highest point of artistry in conveying the process of layering various tracks of music and of getting the various musicians to achieve a kind of perfection (to Brian’s ears) on each of those tracks.

The sixties sequence is brilliantly paired and interleaved with the eighties sequence via some inspired film editing. In the sixties, we watch Brian grow and achieve a kind of apotheosis in his music, even as his life and mental stability spiral down and out of control. Paired up to the sixties, the sine wave of his life turns positive as he slowly leaves the mental trough that he has lived in under the control of Dr. Landy. According to the film, Melinda’s love and concern for Brian coupled with his slow movement away from Landy permit Brian to finally regain some independence and certainly better medical care. The movie strongly implies much of this late in life success comes as a result of Melinda’s intervention. A careful examination of Brian’s life from sources other than the movie would strongly suggest the movie has greatly simplified these two decades in Brian’s life. In fact, the movie implicitly suggests that after the mid-sixties, Brian achieved very little for the next two decades;  a quick review of the albums released by Brian in solo efforts, collaboration with other artists and with the Beach Boys would clearly indicate, nothing could be further from the truth. He remained busy right up the present day.

If unlike me you are a Beach Boys fan, you might enjoy the musical interludes where brief renditions of their various hits and a few of their non-hits are played. However, this is a movie about a composer, his path to the various end products of his efforts, not so much about the musical final products. If you are interested in watching how modern music can be created in a studio by adding one track to another, and how musicians are asked to work through multiple versions of a piece of music until the man driving the process is at last satisfied, then this could be your movie. But mostly, this is a movie about a man that is a musician that has is life derailed by drugs and some personal mental issues that were likely exacerbated by those drugs. There are other actors in the drama of Brian Wilson’s life (a demanding father, a fellow member of the band that wants to go in another musical direction, a bad doctor and a loving second wife), but to my eyes it seemed mostly a tragedy of a life with no clear reason for the tragedy. Was it mental illness, drugs, an abusive father, or some combination of these and other factors? I found this to be the biggest flaw in the movie – what was it that ailed Brian the most? In any event, if you enjoy dramas that are intricately edited, professionally acted that depict the rise and fall of a gifted artist, then this is definitely your movie.

One final point, besides the inspired parts of the movie showing Brian in the studio, a second part that is substantially moving is the end credits. As they roll, the audience is presented with a view of the actual Brian Wilson in the early 2000’s playing his music to an audience. One can easily see that still extant mental struggle of this now not-so-young man as he stares out into his audience, but even more clearly evident in his face is what seems to be some new found joy in playing his music for his fans. The song he plays: Love and Mercy.

 

Book Review: "No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II"

No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II (1994)

5 Stars out of 5

Doris Kearns Goodwin

759 pages

Doris Kearns Goodwin’s Pulitzer Prize winning book “No Ordinary Time” describes the war years of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt. Goodwin begins her chronicle in May of 1940 and largely concludes it in April 1945 after FDR’s death from a cerebral hemorrhage. Goodwin relies on extensive interviews with the people that knew the pair as well as an exhaustive review of their private correspondence and other key secondary historical sources. “No Ordinary Time” is not in the definitive biography category, but it is a good example of the style that Goodwin has also brought to her biographies of Theodore Roosevelt/William Howard Taft and her study of Abraham Lincoln and his cabinet. In each of these books, Goodwin’s research and style of writing lend her books both great historicity and a sense of personal connection to her subject material.

For me, the best part of “No Ordinary Time” is the section devoted to 1940. Having grown up in the sixties, I have had an inborn sense that America was always ready and willing to defend herself; in fact, ready to defend any country or group of people that needed defending from the tyrants of the world. To be sure, there is considerable naiveté in such a belief. Like any country, the US will always ensure that her needs are first being met whenever she ventures into war. But the willingness to intervene or the actual lack thereof were striking features of the period leading up to WWII and indeed continued well into the war as FDR and his advisors actively chose not to defend the rights of Americans of Japanese extraction, or only reluctantly chose to move to defend the rights of Black Americans, and in awful fact chose not to take certain actions to reduce the carnage experienced by the Jews of Europe.

Goodwin spends some little time explaining the personal histories of FDR and ER. He was the only and thoroughly adored child of a wealthy couple made up of an aged father and doting, younger mother. The death of FDR’s father and the now enhanced attention his mother could now foist on him helped create a remarkably secure but terribly secretive (as regards his inner life) adolescent, and in time adult. ER’s situation could not have been more different. She grew up in a loving and nearly equally prosperous family as her fifth-cousin FDR, but unfortunately for her, also in the home of an alcoholic father – one who would die and leave his family in some fiscal and emotional straits. Fortunately for ER, her uncle, the older brother to her unfortunate father was Theodore Roosevelt. TR took an active interest in the family of his younger brother and did make various attempts to help ER’s family situation. But like FDR, the situation of her youth, the cauldron from which she would arise shaped ER just as surely as FDR’s far more secure childhood shaped his. ER would grow with an unquenchable desire to intervene on the behalf of the less fortunate, but quite likely just as insecure in her most intimate relationships as FDR was secure in all of his. It is easy to over generalize but based on Goodwin’s recitation of the events leading to the adulthood of FDR and ER, it is tempting to draw some conclusions about their remarkable and troubled marital union.

Goodwin uses a layered approach to her biographies wherein she begins a description of (say) the events of May 1940 when Hitler is on the very cusp of waging a devastating aerial bombardment of England and how and why FDR and ER would respond to both the international events in FDR’s case or the plight of the American Negro in ER’s case. Having narrated an historical record for both FDR and ER, she uses inference and occasionally more direct explanation for their action. Why was FDR so driven to help England and his close friend Winston Churchill; why was ER as equally driven to improve the situation for America’s Negros (I use the term the Goodwin has chosen and presumably the times chose to use), or the mine workers, or union members, or enlisted men, or and the list is a very long one of Americans not well served by the wealthy and powerful.

As noted above, I found the efforts made by America and FDR to first move from a position of absolute unpreparedness to become the “Arsenal of Democracy”, to move from strict isolationism to waging wars over two oceans, to move from being a bystander to world events to being a shaper of world events. Goodwin narrates a long involved tale that describes the various legal and legislative machinations made by FDR when he set up Lend Lease to first help England and later the USSR and Joseph Stalin. Added to the considerable difficulties FDR faced in moving a very recalcitrant congress to establish the means to help these two erstwhile allies, he also faced immense hurdles in turning American’s peacetime manufacturing energies into wartime powerhouses: making tanks and airplanes instead of cars, making gunpowder instead of ceramics, and making transport ships at a rate faster than the German U-boats could sink them – something they did not do very well until 1942. However, by 1943 America was supplying her own military and that of the English and the Russians, and doing it at a pace that was several factors higher than the early targets for planes, tanks, ships and armament that were initially thought to be impossible to achieve. Goodwin goes to great lengths to demonstrate just how integral FDR’s vision and most importantly his leadership went into creating this powerful force for good.

At the same time, ER continued her work as America’s conscience. Prior to the outbreak of war and following the near catastrophic (in a marital sense) discovery by ER of FDR’s romantic relationship with Lucy Mercer (ironically one of ER’s aides), ER had sought to find her own way; a way that supported FDR but was in many ways independent of FDR. Throughout their marriage, ER protested time and again her love for FDR, but her actions clearly show her first priority was a passionate desire to be busy; to be busy working tirelessly helping others. ER travelled the US in the years prior to WWII always acting as the eyes and ears for a president limited by his job requirements and physical condition. Their dinners on the evenings of her returns to DC appear to have been one half familial reunions, one half business meetings. According to Goodwin, this type of life was essential to keeping FDR more fully informed of the effects of his social legislation, was essential to ER’s desperate need to help the downtrodden, but perhaps most of all, critically important to ER’s sense of self. On those occasions when events conspired to force her into a traditional First Lady role, she chafed; on the many other occasions when she could break free and do some good, she bloomed.

Thus when WWII dawned in Europe and even more so following 7December1941 when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and forced America to finally enter the war as more than an arms merchant, ER was very ill prepared for the second place (or worse) position the previous decade’s social programs had to take. FDR was overwhelmingly preoccupied with conducting the war, and after a long day of having done so, was rarely prepared to face ER at dinner and her constant push for the rights of Black America, of Americans of Japanese descent, of housing for workers, of European Jew immigration to America, and of many other “rights of man” types of issues. Worse for ER and her goals was the simple fact that the level of racism in 1940’s America would startle an American in 2015. Racism was rampant in the government and the military. The mere concept of equal protection under the law for Black Americans in the Navy, for example, was so non-existent, the longest battle fought during the years of 1940 to 1943 was whether Black sailors could perform any job outside of the mess hall. In Detroit as the burgeoning population of workers swelled to work in the arms industry based there, fights over housing became violent and always seemed to have a racial component. Americans in the 40’s not only did not have any sense of equal protection, they did not seem to think it was ever even a question; it was simply natural that WASP rights superseded all others – there was never any question of this basic fact. And when ER as she so often did in her daily newspaper column called for recognition of such rights, she would receive letters of startlingly insensitivity telling her she was a troublemaker, the source of the various riots over the denial of such rights, and that she really should just go home and take care of FDR as any good wife would. Needless to say, ER did not do any such thing.

The war years for FDR and ER were difficult years for them as a couple, for ER’s passionate pursuit of rights for all Americans, and for FDR’s physical health. According to Goodwin, by mid-1944 FDR’s health was in a dangerous decline. America and her allies had both the Japanese and Germans in retreat, but the path for FDR to help get them there had ruined his health. He suffered from extremely high blood pressure, his heart was greatly enlarged, and his strength was failing. Now was the time, if ever she was going to do so, that ER should at the very least curtail her activities and spin more time with a man that desperately needed such companionship. But that was not in her nature; she did not seem to see the need in his eyes and she certainly never changed her behavior to meet his needs. Instead, their daughter Anna who had being filling the role of substitute First Lady for nearly a year met her father’s request to arrange an reunion with FDR’s old flame, Lucy Mercer. This relationship continued up to the day of FDR’s death. It was an unfortunate position to place Anna, and yet was a strange kind of symbol for the unusual partnership between FDR and ER. That someone that loved them both, which wanted to help them both was forced to try and find a middle way to please them both at the very end of their marriage.

It’s hard to read “No Ordinary Time” and not be simultaneously impressed and disappointed in ER and FDR. They were both people of towering abilities, leadership and vision, and yet so very human. FDR couldn’t not flirt or worse with a significant number of women that came into his life, while ER could hardly extend the love she wrote of so often in her letters to FDR or her children. His extroverted, overly self-confident pursuit of any relationship he wanted stood in stark contrast to her constant withdrawal into the introvert’s private seclusion any time she felt over-whelmed by events. And yet, between the two of them, it is impossible to find any couple in American history that have done even half as much as the two of them did during the war years of WWII. Goodwin’s book won’t tell the reader too much about the war at the front, but it will tell you a lot about two very gifted people and what they accomplished for America. This book is a must read.

Movie Review: The Martian

The Martian (2015)

PG-13

3.5 Stars out of 5

Director                              Ridley Scott
Writer                                 Drew Goddard, Andy Weir (book)
Cinematography               Dariusz Wolski
Music                                  Harry Gregson-Williams

Matt Damon                      Mark Watney
Jessica Chastain                 Melissa Lewis
Kristen Wiig                        Annie Montrose
Jeff Daniels                         Teddy Sanders
Michael Pena                     Rick Martinez
Sean Bean                           Mitch Henderson
Kate Mara                           Beth Johanssen
Chiwetel Ejiofor                 Vincent Kapoor

 

Like similar tales that have come before (“Gravity” – 2013, “Cast Away” - 2000, “Apollo 13” - 1995, even “Robinson Crusoe on Mars” – 1964, and many more), Hollywood loves a good survival story. What could be more compelling than a resilient hero pushed to his or her limits fighting the environment and their own personal demons in order to survive? Combine this cinematic trope with some spectacular cinematography illustrating Martian landscapes, sprinkle in some reasonable acting from Matt Damon and the under-used Jessica Chastain; borrow some scenes from “Apollo 13” and “Gravity” (apparently when all else fails in space, you simply have to jump really, really hard in order to save yourself), and some (let’s say) irritating music from the Disco era, and you have the recipe for “The Martian”. That being said, it was a fairly entertaining film.

Mark Watney (Matt Damon) is on a mission to Mars with his disco music loving commander Melissa Lewis (Jessica Chastain) when a very nasty storm rolls in. Are such storms even possible in Mars’ thin atmosphere, and if they are what’s NASA’s plan for their escape module to avoid falling over in such a wind? These questions and more may run through your mind as you watch Mark get left behind by Melissa and the rest of her crew, Beth Johanssen (Kate Mara), Mark’s wisecracking buddy Rick Martinez (Michael Pena), and a couple others too insignificant to list here. Commander Melissa is led to believe by events that Mark is dead and as such leaves Mars with a heavy heart before her escape pod falls over and they are all stranded. Mark, of course (spoiler alert) is not dead. The bulk of the movie depicts how he is going to “science the heck out Mars” in order to survive. Needless to say, he has a few setbacks, but where there is a will, there is a way (at least in Hollywood).

To the movie’s and the writers’ credit, there is considerable time spent watching the team at NASA in Houston and JPL in Pasadena work with Mark to help him help himself. This movie borrows the scene from “Apollo 13” wherein some tape and a bunch of stuff on the table must be used in order to create a jury-rigged oxygen generator. “Apollo 13” had the benefit of being based on actual events; “The Martian” does not. Instead, we are asked to believe that Mark can solve a leaking space suit helmet with duct tape (it’s silvery, so maybe it’s NASA duct tape) and then shortly thereafter seal up his compromised habitat with the same tape and some plastic sheeting – remember, this is the same planet that had winds which just about toppled the escape pod. Oh well, its “science” fiction; emphasis on the fiction.

This type of movie follows such a set formula, you can almost set your watch to the events on screen: Mark solves a problem, next problem coming up in 3, 2, 1 seconds – bingo, go solve another one Mark. The writers do address this scenario in the very end during a lecture to new astronauts: they must be prepared to do just that, solve one problem, then another. So, maybe, this really is the way space travel is and will be conducted; or maybe, it just some kind of cinematic alarm clock that must be adhered to. However, formula or not, “The Martian” as directed by Ridley Scott and written by Drew Goddard based on a book by Andy Weir is exciting. You know problems are coming, you know solutions will always be there, so don’t worry about the predictability, just sit back and enjoy the ride. And it is an entertaining ride, a ride made the more enjoyable by the remarkable sceneries created to stand in for Mars coupled with some very poetic cinematography by Dariusz Wolski.

The technical tools used to make this movie, the build –up and release of tension and the frequently wry comments made by Mark as he addresses his seemingly hopeless situation help make this a fun movie. It quite probably would have been a better candidate for the summer blockbuster season, but considering how well it has done in the market place, it would seem the studio knew what it was doing when it released “The Martian” during the roll up to the Oscar-contending film release season. One other curious note about the movie is the use of large amounts of Disco music in the soundtrack. The screenplay has Mark complain fairly non-stop about Melissa’s musical choice, and I presume the viewers must assume she is the only one to have brought any music to Mars, but what was Ridley Scott and Drew Goddard thinking? Is there some musical or thematic reason to use this musical genre? Are they trying to drive the audience that much closer to the edge of their seats with musical anxiety? In any event, “The Martian” can fall into my guilty pleasures category. There are no surprises, no deep currents running in this movie, but it was a fun and thrilling ride to spend a rainy afternoon watching.

Movie Review: Bridge of Spies

Bridge of Spies (2015)

PG-13

4.5 Stars out of 5

Director                               Steven Spielberg
Writer                                  Matt Charman, Ethan and Joel Coen
Cinematography                Janusz Kaminski
Editing                                 Michael Kahn

Mark Rylance                     Rudolf Abel
Tom Hanks                         James Donovan
Amy Ryan                           Mary Donovan
Gary Francis Powers         Austin Stowell
Will Rogers                         Frederick Pryor

 

“Bridge of Spies” tells a tale from the Cold War, a time when children were taught to “duck and cover” to avoid the effects of a nuclear detonation, a time when both the American and Soviet governments planted spies in the other country's territories even as they searched for foreign spies within their own. Director Steven Spielberg has created a thoughtful and seemingly balanced film that describes this tense time. Courtesy of his expert direction and the film editing of Michael Kahn, Spielberg tells the story in a fashion that displays the parallel ways in which the two cold war adversaries viewed one another from the perspective of their own national defense. In many ways, each country's behavior is understandable, it is in the details (as is so often so) that the differences between the two societies becomes clear – what do they stand for, if they stand for anything at all.

The movie begins with a clever over the shoulder view of a painter executing a self-portrait. While it is clear who is the painter, and who the reflection, this opening scene does a good job of creating a metaphor for the coming test of wills over national intentions and identities. The painter is actually a Soviet spy, Rudolf Abel (Mark Rylance). He speaks with a faint Scottish accent that apparently derives from his early years, but his adult years have been spent in the USSR. He now plies his trade as a spy for the Soviet Union in Brooklyn NY. He is caught by the FBI but that has been done so with only scant attention paid by the FBI to the normal criminal proceedings with respect to search warrants. He is to be tried in a local criminal proceeding, and the US government wants him to have a proper legal defense. To that end, insurance attorney James Donovan (Tom Hanks), someone with a criminal defense background is brought in to represent Abel.

Rylance and Hanks put on a set of the most subtle and nuanced performances that I have seen in the past several years. This movie is easily worth watching just to watch the two of these seasoned actors portray their roles. Abel is a decent man; true he works for the enemy and to the destruction of our way of life. But in the end he is a soldier for his country. He acts constantly throughout this film as a man of principle. Hanks too can only be seen in these very same lights. Despite the overt opposition from the judge (who has convicted Abel in his own mind even before the start of the legal proceedings), the covert intrusion from the CIA and the various threats against Donovan and his family for defending Abel, James Donovan does not ever veer from his own set of values – values that he clearly defines as American. Take for example his discussion with a CIA agent; the agent states there is no rule book for the situation that Donovan has found himself in – the agent like most everyone in the film, believes their only goal is to convict Abel. Donovan corrects him by stating there is a rule book and it is the US constitution. He goes on to state that despite his own Gaelic heritage and the agent’s German, what unites them is their allegiance to American ideals and laws. This is not a subtle point in the movie, but it is a highlight.

Donovan is unable to save Abel from the judge, but he is able to convince the judge to “save” Abel by not executing him; the reason being, the US may need Abel for some future prisoner exchange. And once Francis Gary Powers is shot down over the USSR, just such an exchange is needed. Due to some convoluted reasoning, Donovan is brought back into this sordid play between nations to act as a mediator. The problem becomes even more complicated when the location for the exchange is the Glienicke Bridge in East Berlin. Since it is in East Berlin, the East Germans are now part of this complicated pas de deux, which has now become a ménage a trois. And the Germans have their own American prisoner, an American graduate student, Frederick Pryor (Will Rogers). The CIA wants Donovan to forsake Pryor, the Germans want to be included and thus recognized by the American government, and the Soviets just want their spy back before he spills any state secrets. Of the participants, only Donovan wants what seems to be the moral thing: an exchange of prisoners. He does not have any hidden or nationalistic agenda items.

Spielberg and writers Ethan and Joel Coen, and Matt Charman have created in this film an excellent comparison of nationalistic views. Americans see Abel as a traitor (even though he is not American), as an enemy to be caught, tried, convicted and executed. The Soviets see Powers in quiet the same lights, as an enemy agent flying illegally over their sovereign lands; essentially he has invaded them. The East Germans may well have the least to complain about; their prisoner is little more than an unfortunate American pawn caught up in their game. There is little right or wrong to distinguish either the Americans or the Soviets. Both feel they are acting in the best interests of their homelands. But there are differences, and Spielberg with his writers makes sure we see them: Abel is given a real lawyer and a decent cell, while Powers is instead treated to sleep deprivation and a miserable cell filled with ice cold water. Is it only in the details that the Americans and the Soviets differ? It is unlikely that Spielberg intends this, else he would have given far less time and attention to Donovan’s several small speeches on how Americans are defined by their ideals, not in effect by their jail cells per se. But if one thinks about even the jail cells some more, maybe even there in such small places and details as a jail cell, where even a prisoner is accorded or not accorded the basic necessities that any human, even a spy is entitled to.

“Bridge of Spies” may have a title dreamed up in Hollywood, but it has some of the best acting, directing and writing to come out of Hollywood in years. The pace of this movie may annoy some viewers, but in a time when Americans too often define themselves by their political party with their narrow interests and not by  the broader ideals that define the American way, this movie is a good primer on some of things that do justify a sense of American exceptionalism. This is easily one of the best movies for 2015.

 

Movie Review: "Ex Machina"

Ex Machina (2015)

R

5 Stars out of 5

Director/Writer                 Alex Garland

Domhnall Gleeson           Caleb
Oscar Isaac                        Nathan
Alicia Vikander                 Ava
Sonoya Mizuno                Kyoko

 

Like “Under the Skin”, “2001: A Space Odyssey”, or “Cloud Atlas”, director/writer Alex Garland’s “Ex Machina” uses science fiction to brilliantly explore topics not easily examined in other genres: male/female power relationships, male roles in society, the importance given to superficial appearances, what it means to be human, and above all else the role that lying plays in everyday human experience. Almost every aspect of “Ex Machina” comes together to produce a film that will stand as a classic definition of not only what can be done with science fiction, but a movie that can stand just like “2001” as an icon for big ideas intelligently explored in film.

“Ex Machina” begins with a young programmer, Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson) winning a company-wide contest to spend a week with his company’s CEO and founder, Nathan (Oscar Isaac). Nathan is an amalgam of contemporary technology-based corporate titans such as Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, or more to the point in terms of actual technology, the two founders of Google: Larry Page and Sergey Brin. Nathan wrote the code at age thirteen that formed the basis his company, Blue Book (its name surely also an amalgam from Blue Tooth and Face Book). However, while Nathan has advanced in chronological age from thirteen to roughly thirty-five, he remains emotionally a teenager, as the naïve Caleb will soon discover once he reaches Nathan’s fortress-like home somewhere (seemingly) in the middle of Glacier National Park.

When Caleb first meets Nathan, the latter is busy flexing his muscles by pounding on a punching bag. Nathan mixes his language to Caleb with a hearty brew of frat-boy “bro’s” and “dudes”. He exudes his acquired alpha male status on multiple occasions by dismissing any comment he considers contrary by Caleb – this is no meeting of equals despite Nathan’s exhortation to Caleb that he consider it so. Nathan has brought Caleb to his home/laboratory in order that Caleb might assess whether or not a robot with artificial intelligence capabilities built by Nathan would pass the Turing Test. This test simply put is whether or not an AI when hidden from view from the tester would be indistinguishable from a human. Nathan has decided to up the ante in his test. He has made a sexualized female robot that is clearly a robot. He states this makes the test that much more difficult to administer and to pass. Will Caleb knowing that the robot named Ava (Alicia Vikander) be able to convince him that she is self-aware and actually thinking, not just simulating the same? Adding to the complexity is that Ava  has been built to look and act feminine within the constraints that she must also clearly be artificial and not organic in terms of her origins.

Thus ensues a series of interviews between Caleb and Ava that are set apart as if in chapters. It is a kind of cat and mouse game between Ava and the intelligent but confused Caleb, but also between Ava and Nathan as he watches unseen via cameras and audio hook-ups designed to let him observe. Nathan is helped to some degree by the mute Kyoko (Sonoya Mizuno), someone Nathan claims can neither speak nor understand English. As the movie progresses, I was compelled almost from the beginning to start watching each scene and wondering whether the character was lying or not. Nathan with his unstable behavior of alternating intelligence, his belligerence, his constant heavy drinking seems to exude a kind of malignity that screams, “be careful Caleb, you are in danger”. This theme is bolstered early in the movie when Ava during one of the frequent electrical failures which she believes shield her from Nathan’s prying eyes, gives the same warning to Caleb, “Nathan is not your friend”.

But is Ava, Caleb’s friend? He stares at her longingly from the beginning. His focus on her face and hands, the only parts made to look human, allows him to forget that she is not human. It allows him to indulge his young male’s desire for feminine company, even as her programming (?) permits that she act as any young woman in her forced isolation would do. For her situation is not only peculiar in that she is a robot playing the role of a woman, she is also a “woman” in peril. Nathan has locked her into her room and will not permit her to roam freely throughout the house, let alone escape it to the outside world. Her peril is made that much more clear when she asks Caleb what will Nathan do with her once the “Turing Test” is concluded, pass or fail. Caleb states he does not know, but he worries, and his worries are made even more manifest once he learns from Nathan that like the earlier models of Ava 9.0, she will be re-made. She will lose all memory of the Ava that Caleb has come to know. Both Ava and Nathan make it quite clear to Caleb, Ava is in danger.

But who speaks the truth in this movie, what is Nathan’s, Ava’s, or even Kyoko’s agenda? As the movie progresses, it becomes increasingly clear that like Dr. Frankenstein, Nathan has started to think of himself in a God-like role. And yet, like the most typical of adolescent male tech nerds, he also dwells on the idea of a beautiful woman that is in thrall to his every whim. Has Nathan made Ava’s 1.0 to 9.0 to indulge his sexual desires, to become more God-like in his stunted emotional state, to exercise his formidable creativity, or more likely as with every flawed human, some combination of each, of good and evil? And what of Ava, does she truly have an interest in Caleb or is he merely as tool to attain her freedom? Should she attempt to pass the Turing Test and gain that freedom, or is that a fantasy; must she instead and unlike the generic woman-in-peril gain her freedom by taking it for herself by using the men that oppress her or stand in her way? Even the silent Kyoko, her hidden facial movements having revealed on more than one occasion that she too has her own agenda, what is it that she wants?

“Ex Machina” explores in careful detail each of these questions and brings the movie to a satisfying close; a close that suggests the gap between machine and human intelligence is narrower than one might think, especially when it comes to desires for personal freedom. Additionally, it suggests that lying and deception are behaviors that humans utilize so well in order to get their way, that that was the final test of Ava’s consciousness – that she not only sought her freedom but was sufficiently intelligent and self-aware that she could and would employ that most human of traits, lying to achieve her ends. And of course, not just lying, but violence of a very dispassionate nature would also be used by Ava to get her way - you can't get much more human than that.

But “Ex Machina” is really so much more. Watch how Caleb self-deceives himself about Ava. Of course Ava saw it too and used it to her advantage. But what is Caleb really thinking when he thinks of Ava? Does he focus solely on her all too beautiful human face and completely forget that physically she is anything but human. Does he stop to wonder at the nature of the mind within Ava’s physical form, at its so non-human origins? What possibly could such a mind value and want; is there any overlap with Caleb's mind? Does he really believe that her Google/internet models of human behavior make her human (let alone female) in any manner? Or is he simply reacting as his male genes have programmed him? He sees the feminine parts of a thing, and his maleness drives him as if he too were a machine programmed to seek out and mate with such a “female”. In what ways is his behavior any less programmed than hers?

That “Ex Machina” discusses these topics carefully but in a manner that is not off-putting, is testament to the writing. That the viewer can readily identify the character type played by Oscar Isaac is proof of his fine acting (see him also in 2014’s “A Most Violent Year”, or HBO’s 2015 “Show Me a Hero”). In a far more subtle role of Ava where Swedish actress Alicia Vikander has little more than her face and voice, the actress must display a kind of pseudo-naiveté that suggests vulnerability and yet seems to conceal a kind of powerful intelligence. There is also one very carefully choreographed scene where after appearing to Caleb in a woman’s dress and wig, she slowly and seductively removes a piece of hosiery. Did she presume that Caleb was watching, was she continuing her act, her seduction of the miserably confused Caleb, or like the disguised female alien in "Under the Skin" played by Scarlett Johansson, has Ava come to actually think of herself as a woman? (Think about how both films have the nude female alien or robot "admire" or check themselves for errors in the mirror - what is each thinking: I'm beautiful or my disguise is perfect? it is far from clear in either movie.)

There are so many sophisticated topics and they are portrayed so beautifully within “Ex Machina” that it is hard to stop describing them all. For me though, this movie hearkens to the equally brilliant “Under the Skin”. Humans are so programmed by our culture, our childhood, and our genes, that when we see an array of fruit arranged in the shape of a face, we define being mentally sound by our ability to see the face. In “Ex Machina”, Caleb sees very little more than a human woman’s face on the body of a robot, but he evidently and despite his clear intelligence and awareness of the situation, responds only a woman, not to a robot with a human face. He responds as a man. Humans so rarely look past the skin; we so rarely notice the evidence that our eyes and brain could pick up of telling differences from conventional humanity, and we respond as if the alien or robot before us is indeed human. Of course, reacting as humans is yet another big topic: what we do to achieve our ends, what lies we tell, what atrocities we will commit, all with the end goal of achieving our desires. “Ex Machina” explores these topics so deftly, I feel certain it will join “2001” and a few others as a classic example of what science fiction and film can accomplish.

 

Book Review: "Island Beneath the Sea" by Isabel Allende

Island Beneath the Sea (2009 in Spanish/2010 in English)

3.0 Stars out of 5

Isabelle Allende

English Translation: Margaret Sayers Peden

457 pages (hardcover version)

Isabel Allende has written eighteen books of fiction plus four of non-fiction. “Island Beneath the Sea” is her 15^th. As a Chilean-American (born in Peru to a Chilean diplomat; lived in America since 1989) she gained early notoriety by writing in the magic-realism genre (see “The House of the Spirits” – 1982); so much so, that “magical feminism” is a term that has been coined to reflect Allende’s particular use of sagas that feature strong willed women spread out over several generations. Sadly, “Island Beneath the Sea” is a reasonably interesting book of historical fiction concerning late 18^th century slave life in Haiti and Louisiana but it contains little “magic” of the fantastic or artistic variety.

“Island Beneath the Sea” is the life story of Zarite born a mulatta slave in Sant-Domingue. For all but those closest to her, Zarite is known as Tete. Tete is sold as a young teen to a beautiful courtesan known as Violette, another woman of mixed race (a “quadroon”), but one that had never been a slave. Violette has fairly high status in Saint-Domingue amongst the wealthy land-owners from France. One such owner in particular, Toulouse Valmorain adores Violette and relies heavily upon her for advice as he prepares to marry a young woman from Cuba. He buys Tete from Violette in order that the young slave might care for his bride to be at his sugar plantation (Saint Lazare) near Le Cap. Valmorain at times seems to have mixed and self-contradictory views towards slavery, but in the end, he very nearly never fails to regards slaves as slaves and not as humans.

Tete cares for Valmorain’s new wife as she slowly falls into madness and gives birth to a young boy. Even before his mad wife dies, Valmorain forces himself on Tete and fathers two children, first a boy and then a girl by Tete. Valmorain takes the boy from Tete as an infant but allows Tete to raise the girl. As Valmorain starts to sink into a dissolute life, so does Saint-Domingue start to fall apart as a colony. The brutal treatment of Africans bears bitter fruit: a slave rebellion that causes France to lose control of their island colony to various factions, but most notably to one led by Toussaint Louverture. As the rebellion rises to a fever pitch of revenge and violence, Valmorain flees his plantation for Le Cap. He displays very little courage or later gratitude as his life is saved by Tete. She is near death as she nears Le Cap still caring for Valmorain and his children (legitimate and illegitimate). Valmorain and Tete eventually manage to escape Saint-Domingue (now Haiti) for New Orleans where Valmorain sets up a new plantation using stolen funds. He continues his abuse of Tete never really understanding her or thinking of her as a human until his own death nears.

Allende has woven an interesting historical tale of life in late 18^th century Haiti. She is able to describe with considerable horror the life of a sugar plantation slave: brutally short and lacking in any sense of humanity. As one reads this book, one is quickly filled with loathing for the white French that so casually used and abused the Africans they kidnapped from their homes. Her descriptions of the short life these poor people led as they worked and died in the cane fields is sadly the high point of the novel. It is enlightening and depressing to learn of the active tortures they endured at the hands of the overseers, but even more so as they have their humanity stripped from them right along with their freedom. How anyone in modern America can look back at slavery and come to the conclusion that the slaves (or workers as such apologists would like to refer to them) had lives worth living is completely beyond me.

Allende is clear in the degradations suffered by the slaves of Haiti, and reaches whatever subtlety she does achieve in “Island Beneath the Sea” (btw: Island Beneath the Sea is the slaves’ concept of Heaven) when she writes of the life-long struggle Tete makes in order to live as a free woman. Even more important to Tete is that she is able to obtain the freedom of her daughter; the daughter to Valmorain as well; a daughter he thinks of as no more than property and an embarrassment to his white Louisianan wife. But these points aside there is no real nuance to this story or to the characters. Tete is somewhat well described as is Valmorain, but they are quite frankly two-dimensional; neither shows any real character development nor any real understanding of their situations. Their story and that of those around them simply does not dwell on the nature of Man vs. slave; it merely describes them.

There is value in reading such a description but this subject material offered a rich topic on which much more might have been built. Instead of dwelling on the clothing of the various characters or their too rich diet, some thought could have been spent on what they thought. As noted, there is no magic in this book, there is no novelty in how it is told or in the characters. Allende comes close in her descriptions of Tete’s devotion to dance and the hallucinogenic state she enters when she dances. Tete feels she is “mounted” by her voodoo Goddess Erzulie, and there is almost (almost) a sense of the magic felt by Tete. But again, these few moments also really only are described to the reader, not felt by the reader. “Island Beneath the Sea” follows Allende’s career-long focus on woman and family stories, but its melodramatic elements simply do not add up to much. “Island Beneath the Sea” has some value in introducing a description of slave life in Haiti and New Orleans, but it falls far short of great fiction, or even of Allende’s best work.

Movie Review: "Big Eyes"

Big Eyes (2014)

PG-13

2.5 Stars out of 5

Director                               Tim Burton
Writer                                  Scott Alexander, Larry Kraraszewski

Amy Adams                        Margaret Keane
Christoph Waltz                 Walter Keane
Danny Houston                 Dick Nolan

 

The question of what is art is a question that lingers in the minds of many, and it seems there are as many answers to the question. Tim Burton offers one opinion on the topic with his late 2014 movie, “Big Eyes”. “Big Eyes” tells the story of Margaret Keane in 1950’s/1960’s San Francisco. Margaret is devoted to her art of young children that have stylized “big eyes” in her paintings. That no one in the art world thought of her art as “art”, or that almost no one in 1950’s America could think of a woman (with few notable exceptions) as an artist provides the framework upon which Burton erects his own attempt of cinematic art. Like Margaret though, Burton comes up sadly short.

The movie begins with Margaret (Amy Adams) fleeing her suburban home with her daughter for a new life in North Beach, San Francisco. She hopes to launch her career as a painter in this famous art colony by trying to sell her various paintings of waifs with their puppies, their kittens, their large emotive eyes. She meets with universal failure until she meets Walter Keane (Christoph Waltz) as he too attempts to sell his cityscape paintings depicting Paris’ West Bank. That Walter’s work is hardly less successful artistically is made clear later in the film as he tries to sell his work to local art galleries. That Walter’s nature is far different from Margaret’s is made equally clear as he prances and weaves tales to his potential customers in the park. Margaret silently witnesses Walter’s antics until the day when Walter turns his “charm” on Margaret. They meet, they date, they kiss, they get married.

As the new couple begins their life together, Walter comes up with a scheme to display their respective art on the walls of a nearby nightclub. Taking advantage of one woman’s interest in Margaret’s paintings, Walter’s claims the art as his own in order (he claims later to Margaret) to close the sale – “obviously” no one would believe any serious art could be done by a woman? Walter’s “big eye art” starts to gain traction with the local non-art critic influenced art buying public. In time through Walter’s scheming, Margaret’s paintings sold as Walter’s work become immensely popular. The attention her paintings are getting, the money they bring in and the lack of credit she receives begin a metamorphic effect on Margaret. After years of living in the shadows, she eventually comes forward to claim credit and to stand on her own.

Throughout the movie, both before her commercial success and afterwards, the Art world rejects Margaret’s paintings as art. One critic commenting that Margaret’s work reminded her of a submission to an advertisement at the back of a magazine exhorting readers to sign up for an art class by sending an example of their work. As untutored as I am in the nature of paintings with or without artistic merit, I could not but agree. Margaret’s work displays some understanding of the mechanics of working in oils or acrylics, but her composition is so simplistic and lacking in feeling except for what she hopes to display through her “children” mournful gazes, that I cannot think that she would be considered anything more than a skilled high school art student; but surely nothing more. However, as Andy Warhol (himself in the category of questionable artist in my opinion) comments at the beginning of the movie that “I think what Keane has done is terrific! If it were bad, so many people wouldn’t like it.” I cannot really argue this point, but it is an idea worth considering: is art best defined by a select group of people educated on the topic, or by the masses; is art elitist or egalitarian? I don’t have the answer, but I do love the question.

However, in the case of the artistic merits of Burton’s movie “Big Eyes”, there is I believe a much more clear answer. The movie is elevated by Adams’ careful and studied portrayal of woman taught by the events of her life to submit, to stay out of the way of the men around. And yet, as with any person, Margaret has her limits: she met them with her first husband and then again with Walter. Adams does an excellent job of acting with her face and body language to show both sides of these competing drives within her. Waltz on the other hand plays Walter as a one note scheming con man. He starts out at a medium level of falseness when he first meets Margaret and steadily ramps up his performance to near camp by the movie’s climax. This lack of tone control in the movie is added to a bizarre sequence in a check-out line at the supermarket where Margaret hallucinates that all about her have her paintings’ signature “big eyes”. Why is this scene even in the movie? Are we to believe that Margaret is suffering a nervous breakdown; it is far from clear. One further disruption to the flow of the movie comes in the form of a voice over provided by a local “newspaperman” Dick Nolan (Danny Houston). Nolan is in the movie as a character but also as a narrator. His performance as a co-conspirator with Walter is intelligent and useful to propel the story, but his disruptive comments as narrator add little and conflict with the emotions displayed in the movie.

“Big Eyes” raises an interesting topic in the form of the nature of art and of the role of woman in the late fifties America. It has excellent acting by Adams, a lovely song at the end by Lana Del Rey, and a very odd role played by the previously excellent Waltz (see “Inglourious Basterds” for a much better role and acting example by Waltz). But the lack of tone control, the lack of a story arc that delves more than superficially into the two themes under discussion force me to admit my disappointment in a director who has over the years has made me one of his biggest fans.

For Burton fans that haven’t yet seen them (I doubt there are many who haven’t), check out “Beetlejuice”, “Nightmare Before Christmas”, or “Edward Scissorhands”, these movies are amongst the iconic examples that give a great view into the mind of Tim Burton.