Movies to see: The Intouchables and Waste Land; skip Interstellar

6/23/15 Interstellar, Best Visual Effects, 2015

Normally I don't write the review as I am watching a movie, however, I am in such pain and agony from watching this movie, Interstellar, that I just want to be done with it. all I hear from the dialog is "blah, blah, blah", and I could care less about the characters, this is all so pretentious. It won for Best Visual Effects and so far, one hour and fifty minutes in, with another 50 minutes to go, I'm thinking Guardians of the Galaxy got robbed, absolutely robbed. Basically the Earth is a dying planet, and Matthew McConaughey is Cooper, a pilot but he is forced to farm. Oh, I'm sorry, I don't care enough to recap the plot. I wanted to turn off the movie forty minutes ago, I'm missing tonight's episode of "Rizzoli and Isles". If you want a recap synopsis of the plot and all of the science, you should check out the Wikipedia article. The set up to the more climactic scenes (I think I'm watching one now) was way too long; when are directors going to learn (in my opinion) that making a movie longer does not make it better, it just makes it longer. I'm not a huge fan of science fiction anyway, so maybe I should stop. I did enjoy Gravity however. So, this may be the lamest review in quite a while - I do not like this movie, I would not recommend and I hope it ends soon.

Good night.

6/24/15 The Intouchables, 2012

As much as I complained about not caring about the characters in Interstellar, I hope to convey how invested I felt in Philippe (Francois Cluzet) and Driss (Omar Sy) in the French film, The Intouchables. The movie is based on a true story. Philippe is a wealthy quadriplegic who is looking for a new caregiver; Driss is a African immigrant currently looking to get a signature proving he applied for a job, even though he had not planned on taking it. Against any of the logic that his other assistants and friends provide, Philippe hires Driss. They are quite the odd couple, that's for sure; Philippe is an aristocrat who has private planes at his disposal and Driss's family struggles to eke out a living. Despite the economic chasm between them, Driss and Philippe make a connection; Philippe loves that Driss forgets about his disability and treats him and talks to him like a regular, fully functioning person. Driss loves music, especially the American band, Earth, Wind & Fire and breaks out some dance moves at Philippe's historically boring birthday party. A movie like this could go sappy very quickly and easily, but it doesn't. Cluzet has to act with just his face and voice, his character is unable to stomp off in anger, jump for joy, embrace his daughter or friends, and he is wonderful. Sy is joyful as Driss helps Philippe enjoy life again. They bring out the best in one another. I'm often asked what's the best movie I've seen recently, what would I recommend. Sometimes I draw a total blank because I see so many movies, they become a blur. But since I have your attention, you should see The Intouchables and Waste Land.


6/27/15 Waste Land, nominated Best Documentary, 2010

Waste Land works on so many levels: it's a film about an art project, an environmental film and an anthropological film.  Vik Muniz is a Brazilian artist now living in America who decides to go back home for a big project: photographing the workers (catadores) of the world's largest garbage dump and making portraits incorporating a variety of recyclable materials. I hadn't researched this movie or really knew what it was about, but I had seen the other 2010 nominees (including Gasland, Restrepo and the winner Inside Job) and they were all strong contenders, but I wasn't sure about this movie. It took about 15 minutes for me to get into the movie and the teeny tiny subtitles didn't help, but once I got into it, I couldn't tear myself away. Muniz goes to Jardim Gramacho to see how the work is done, meet some of the workers and get some ideas; we meet just a handful of the catadores and hear their stories. We learn how they think that this is hard, but honest work, and more than one of them comments that they would rather be here than doing drugs or working in prostitution. Some workers have been picking recyclables since they were children, helping their parents or working because their parents died; a few of the women worked beside their husbands or had nowhere else to turn after their husbands left them or other tragedies befell them. In spite of that, they still have hopes and dreams, either for themselves or their children. Tiao is the President of the Association of Recycling Pickers, and he's young and thoughtful and has great plans to help his community; Zumbi collects books that he finds in the dump and he has read Machiavelli's The Prince; Valter is a philosophical about the work they do and the role it plays in the environment, and he tries to educate his neighbors who do not work at the dump but add their garbage to the ever-growing pile; Irma is the cook and she is resourceful and the mother-figure to them. I was very moved by the different men and women and their stories, but also how they defied any stereotype or preconceived notion I may have had. The grace and humanity that they had, but also the very real understanding of the importance of their work. The pickers manually extracted tons of recyclable materials that were then made into new products.

Even as we learn about how the pickers go about their arduous job, Vik is going about his project, involving the catadores in gathering material and posing for the photographs. These are not just regular portraits either; Vik projects the images (including one of Taio as Marat in "The Death of Marat" by David) onto a the floor of this large warehouse he is working in and he has Tiao, Zumbi and the others add recyclables to the photos and then he takes another photograph. I wasn't sure how it would turn out, but the pictures were incredible. As the catadores spend more time working on this project, Vik, his wife and his assistant (?) talk about the effect that this change could have on them and would they go back to the dump, what would happen to them, etc. It's an interesting discussion and in this case, not purely theoretical. Vik and Taio go to London to auction off a large print of the "Marat" portrait, and Taio feels like a rock star, and the portrait goes for over $40,000. Muniz's goal was to put that money back into the catadore community and the pickers' association. This is a fabulous movie that should not be missed.

6/27/15 Sherlock Holmes and the Ice Palace Murders, Park Square Theater, St. Paul, MN

 In the 1990s, Twin Cities native and author, Larry Millett started writing a series of Sherlock Holmes mysteries set in Minnesota, several focusing on the Minneapolis/St. Paul area. Twenty years later, Jeffrey Hatcher adapted Millett's second novel into a play. I enjoyed the books, learning about Minneapolis and St. Paul in the early days of Swede Hollow, Pig's Eye Landing, the railways and other ventures of JJ Hill, so I was thrilled to see that new life was being given to Millett's story. For reasons of practicality, I'm sure, the story was condensed as was the list of characters. It has been years since I read the books, but from what I recall, the play was still pretty faithful to the plot. Holmes and Watson are in America for a tour and they are in Chicago when they learn of a mysterious disappearance in St. Paul; instead of heading east to New York, they catch the next train to St. Paul, where they are greeted by the freezing cold of a Minnesota winter. It's 1896 and St. Paul is preparing for the Winter Carnival (we still have a version of the Winter Carnival) and the son of one of the city's civic leaders is missing, and Holmes, Watson and rival, Shadwell Rafferty embark on solving the mystery. The cast was wonderful, and a few of the actors played multiple roles. We had one twist, the lead actor playing Holmes, Steve Hendrickson, was unexpectedly hospitalized, so director, Peter Moore stepped in for him. He still needed the script, but it wasn't as distracting as it could have been, and the show must go on; I thought it was quite brave to do. I had never been to the Park Square Theater before, it was on the smaller side, around 350 capacity, but there's not a bad seat in the house. The theater is located on a pedestrian mall surrounded by restaurants like Great Waters Brewing Co., Kincaid's and several others; it's also walking distance to the light rail and Union Depot. It was a beautiful summer night in St. Paul and we enjoyed the walk back to car, as the Jazz Pub Crawl was wrapping up. It will be a great memory when it's February and freezing.