Room

Room

Although it first premiered at the Telluride Film Festival way back in September 2015, Lenny Abrahamson’s suspenseful family drama Room has finally been given a wide release in the United States for movie fans all across the country to properly enjoy.

The film is based on Emma Donoghues novel of the same name and was written by the author herself. It tells the story of a 24-year-old mother Joy and her 5-year-old son Jack who are being held captive in a tiny, makeshift shed that they call Room. This is all that Jack knows about the world as he was born inside Room and has never left, the only signs of life outside are a tiny skylight and the television they are allowed to watch.  Their captor is actually Jack’s father who abducted Joy when she was teenager and repeatedly raped her while holding them captive inside the secret shed attached to his house. A week after Jack’s fifth birthday Joy believes he is now old enough to help them escape their desperate and horrifying situation.

Since the films premiere and its subsequent limited release, Room has been sweeping up awards quicker than they can be given out. The movie has garnered four Academy Award nominations, and this wider release makes sense as a way to get this low budget film more exposure leading up to Oscar night. After struggling to find her place among Hollywood’s more prominent actresses early in her career, Brie Larson takes her role of a lifetime to new heights and firmly plants herself as someone who won’t be denied any longer. Following television stints on shows like Community and United States of Tara, and supporting movie roles such as Amy Schumers sister in Trainwreck, the 26 year old Larson has already won the Golden Globe and SAG best actress awards on her way to an inevitable Oscar win.

The stark and heartbreaking way in which Larson plays Joy as a mother who refuses to give up fighting for her and her son is a performance that deserves its universal praise, but its newcomer Jacob Tremblay’s work as Jack that really takes the film to another level.

Casting child actors are always one of the most difficult aspects of production especially when the character is such a prominent part of the story. The film almost entirely rests on the tiny shoulders of Jacob but he knocks it out of the park with incredible tenderness and emotional range.

The movie as a whole can be looked at in a number of different ways. You may look at it as a classic crime thriller containing of all the conventional ideas of kidnapping, torture, and eventual escape attempts. But when you look deeper into the meaning of the story you start to think about “Family” and what that word actually means to all of us. The types of emotions that can be conjured up when thinking about our families can sometimes be overwhelming but there is a comfort that I believe each of us finds in realizing the true meaning of the word and how it fits into our lives.

Jack knows nothing about the real world up until the age of 5, but then again which one of us really knew anything either when we were that young?  As horrifying as their situation is, you can certainly make parallels to other types of situations and how you might’ve grown up to escape a “Room” of your own. Through clever storytelling and fascinating characters Room continues finding success because of its connection to anyone still finding a path to true happiness.

Most Anticipated 2016

Most Anticipated 2016

While January and February are notoriously slow months for new movie releases, there are tons of reasons to get excited about the rest of 2016. It will no doubt be a huge year for superhero films and franchise sequels and prequels, but there are a number other films that will be fighting for a piece of that box office pie. Here are my 10 most anticipated movies for the rest of 2016.

10. The Lobster (March 11): This film was released in the UK in late 2015 but will finally get a proper release in the US at the beginning of March. The plot alone should peak your interest enough to give this film a try: Sometime in the future all single people get sent to The Hotel where they must find a romantic partner within 45 days or be turned into an Animal of their choice.

9. Sausage Party (August 12): Seth Rogen and his merry band of comedy pranksters are at it again but this time they get animated… as different grocery store foods. While the premise sounds ridiculous the prospect of hearing the voices of Jonah Hill as a sausage, Kristen Wiig as a hot dog bun, and Edward Norton as a bagel, is enough to get me very interested.

8. Assassins Creed (December 21): Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard will lend their immense talent to this film based on the popular video game series. While movies based on video games have not exactly been successful in the past, these two might just have the power to make an exception to the rule.

7. The BFG (July 1) Steven Spielberg’s new movie is an adaptation of the classic Roald Dahl children’s book The BFG (short for “Big Friendly Giant”). With Hook and E.T. on his resume Spielberg is an expert in bringing emotional family stories to life on the big screen. The film was even written by Melissa Mathison who co-wrote E.T. The Extra Terrestrial with Spielberg back in 1982.

6. Suicide Squad (August 5): This film will be unlike any other superhero movie we have seen because it’s all about the bad guys. When the government needs to perform a dangerous and highly classified mission it brings together a group of supervillains to either get the job done or take the blame if something goes wrong. These villains include Will Smith as Deadshot, Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn, and Jared Leto with his own interpretation of the iconic Joker.

5. The Birth of a Nation (Release TBD): The breakout hit of this year’s Sundance Film Festival is a biographical telling of Nat Turner’s slave rebellion in 1831. The controversial film is 7 years in the making for writer, director, and star Nate Parker and it could not have come at a better time with all of the important racial discussions happening around the country. Fox Searchlight won the distribution rights to the film for $17.5 million, so look for this film to get a proper release later in the year.

4. Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (December 16): The first “spinoff” in the Star Wars universe will introduce us to a group of fighter pilots that are on a mission to steal the famed Death Star’s blueprints. After the release of The Force Awakens Star Wars popularity is at a fever pitch and Disney is hoping these spinoffs will keep the fire going. This film will expand the ever growing universe and will hopefully answer at least some of the unknown questions from Episode 7.

3. Silence (Release TBD) Martin Scorsese’s new film does not have a release date yet but it is expected toward the end of 2016. The new one from the filmmaking legend sounds just as unconventional as it does intriguing. It stars Adam Driver and Andre Garfield as two Jesuit Priests who travel to 17^th century Japan to spread the teachings of Christianity and seek out their mentor played by Liam Neeson.

2. The Nice Guys (May 20) If you haven’t seen Kiss Kiss Bang Bang by writer and director Shane Black drop everything you are doing and watch it immediately.  His new film The Nice Guys looks like it will have the same quick comedic writing, and original visual storytelling that Black is known for. The film stars Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe as two cops in a dark comedy mystery thriller that promises to be one of the most entertaining movies of the year.

1. Midnight Special (March 18): Jeff Nichols is a name that you should really get to know. The 3 movies that he has directed so far are deeply personal and are done with the confidence and simplicity of someone twice his age. He continues his streak of intimate family dramas but in this case he throws his hat into the science fiction genre. Michael Shannon who has starred in all of Nichols previous films returns along with Joel Edgerton, Adam Driver, and Kirsten Dunst. When an 8 year old boy is found to have a special gift, his family must race him to a secret location while being hunted down by the government as well as an extreme religious group. 

The Big Short

The Big Short

When news first broke that Michael Lewis’ book about the 2007-2008 global financial crisis was being adapted into a movie written and directed by Anchorman and Step Brothers director Adam McKay, the reaction was a collective: WTF? Even more intriguing was the fact that the movie would star such high profile Hollywood names such as Brad Pitt, Steve Carrell, Christian Bale, and Ryan Gosling.

The result of this unlikely collaboration is a unique and utterly original telling of the build up of the housing and credit bubble that eventually led to “The Great Recession” which ended in 2009. Making a movie about this type of subject matter would be hard enough, but getting people to understand the material and actually be entertained by it, is a whole other set of challenges.

Based on Lewis’s book of the same name, The Big Short chronicles some of the key individuals who believed the credit and housing bubble would burst, and how they controversially took advantage of the situation by betting against the banks. If the terms “subprime mortgage loan” or “credit default swap” sound painfully dull to you, you wouldn’t be alone.

  The global financial world is not for everyone. It takes a certain type of person to get out of bed in the morning and be excited about these complex terms and concepts. This is exactly why McKay was attracted to this particular story in the first place; the real life characters that Lewis describes in his book are full of idiosyncratic and peculiar behaviors, all while being some of the smartest men in the industry.

By telling the story of the financial crisis and what caused it through the eyes of these absurd personalities, we are better able to understand what’s actually going on while still being invested in the characters. Bale, Carrell, Pitt, and Gosling star as the odd group of Wall Street outsiders who correctly predicted that the markets were going to crash. Gosling also acts as the narrator who sporadically breaks the 4^th wall and talks directly into the camera and to the audience.

This technique is used as a way to help the audience follow along while also providing the necessary comedic relief along the way. Other types of gags are used throughout the film to further help the audience understand what the characters are talking about.This includes a scene of actress Margot Robbie, naked in a bathtub, explaining to us what exactly a “sub prime mortgage” is. As you continue to watch the movie you start to realize not only how important this crisis was, but also how little you knew about it in the first place.

The financial crisis of 07-08 is considered by many of the worlds leading economists to be the worst financial crisis since The Great Depression, yet many everyday Americans do not understand the causes or repercussions of such a global economic failure. McKay succeeds in striking a balance between the amount of information presented to us with the amount of comedy and drama carefully intertwined. Bale and Carrell give stand out performances among the ensemble cast as quirky and eccentric Wall Street executives who not only predict the downfall of the housing economy but also try and exploit their findings to their own financial gains.

The film has pushed McKay out of the slapstick comedy world and into unfamiliar territory with Oscar nominations for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Adapted Screenplay. While The Big Short is not your average comedy, it stands out as an interesting yet unconventional biographical study of one of the most uninteresting topics imaginable.

Anomalisa

Anomalisa

Stop motion animation is a technique that can be found in motion pictures going all the way back to the early 20^th century. This unique approach to visual storytelling has been utilized in some of the most beloved animated movies of all time.

 The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) filled us with dark and twisted imagination, James and the Giant Peach (1996) is an imaginative retelling of a classic children’s novel, and Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009) is a great example of how stop motion animation can appeal to people of all ages.

 There is something unique about how these movies look because of the incremental way the characters and objects are moved within a single frame to give an illusion that they are moving fluidly when the frames are played continuously. Rarely do stop motion films actually transcend the medium and make the audience unaware of what they are watching, that is until ANOMALISA, a groundbreaking and monumental achievement in the stop motion genre.

ANOMALISA at its core is an introspective examination of what it is like to be human, all while featuring no actual live human actors. The film was made with 3D printed puppets that have a super realistic and natural feel to them.

 The screenplay is by Charlie Kaufman who also co-directed the film with Duke Johnson. If the name Charlie Kaufman sounds familiar to you, it should, he is responsible for some of the most innovative and equally absurd scripts of the last few years. Being John Malkovich (1999) brought his name into the mainstream; Adaptation (2002) and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) firmly planted him as one of the most distinctive voices of our generation.

The road to getting his newest screenplay from page to screen was a long and complicated one. The script started as a one-off play that was put on as part of American composer Carter Burwell’s Theater of the New Ear series. Kaufman later turned the play into a longer form screenplay and tried to raise a budget for the film through Kickstarter.  When all was said and done they had the proper financing to turn Kaufman’s surreal romantic comedy-drama into a 90-minute stop motion animation feature film.

            The plot of ANOMALISA is very simple. In fact the film features only 3 different voice actors. Michael Stone (voiced by David Thewlis) is a middle-aged author of customer service related books. When he travels to Cincinnati, Ohio to speak at a convention of customer service professionals he meets a sales rep named Lisa (voiced by Jennifer Jason Leigh).

 Seems pretty uncomplicated on the surface, but then you start to realize that all of the other voices that Michael hears both male and female are the same. The third voice actor is Tom Noonan and he voices every other character that appears in the film from Michael’s point of view. I wont go too far into the details but this is something that is essential to the story and really makes you think deeper about who Michael is and what he is going through.

What occurs within these very specific constraints is nothing short of mind-blowing. The fact that these inanimate objects can be used to conjure up such deep and personal emotion through the amazing illusion of animation is a testament to the vision and passionate execution from everyone involved in the production.

When you watch what is happening between Michael, Lisa, and the rest of the characters you forget they are puppets and it really does play with your mind.  

            This film has the opportunity to resonate with people in a very intimate way. Not only does it deal with every persons desire to fall in love and what that feels like but it touches on the mundanity of everyday life such as, checking into a hotel, talking with strangers on an airplane, awkward conversations with taxi drivers, and how these situations can affect each person differently.

            Based on recent releases, stop motion animated films can either be huge successes or massive box office failures. ANOMALISA isn’t going to reach a typical large audience because of its adult oriented subject matter but it is sure to make waves throughout the industry that I believe will be felt for years to come.

            

Top Ten 2015

Top Ten 2015

With the end of the semester rapidly approaching, and the end of 2015 just weeks away, it is the perfect time to reflect back on the previous year in cinema and offer you a definitive list of my Top Ten favorite films. While these kinds of things are always subjective, my goal is that this list may steer you towards a film you may have missed and can hopefully enjoy sometime down the road. The following films have not only stayed with me long after leaving the theater, but have inspired my passion for watching films and writing about them. So without further ado here are my Top Ten Movies of 2015:

10. EVEREST Baltasar Kormakur’s adventure tale is as big as the mountain itself. It tells the true story of the 1996 disaster on Everest and features epic visuals as well as great performances by its talented ensemble cast.

9. DOPE This Sundance hit is a crazy original comedy-drama featuring a breakout performance by Shameik Moore. It is set in Inglewood, California and follows a group of high school geeks obsessed with 90’s hip hop culture who get swept up in a dangerous adventure after attending a drug dealers party.

8. LOVE Gaspar Noe’s latest shock and awe spectacle is surprisingly more cohesive than his previous work. It is always exciting to see a new Noe film because he is constantly pushing boundaries and finding new and interesting ways to tell stories. The editing, music, cinematography are all top notch here and he keeps you on the edge of your seat with excitement and curiosity, not knowing what you will see, hear, or feel next. 

7. INSIDE OUT Pixar is up to it’s old tricks again mixing inventive storytelling, comedy and emotion, all while telling a powerfully moving story set inside the mind of a little girl. Her five emotions: Joy, Sadness, Anger, Disgust, and Fear are the main characters trying to help her deal with a major life event.

6. THE MARTIAN Veteran of sci-fi Ridley Scott tackles Andy Weir’s book of the same name in impressive fashion. When Mark Watney is left stranded on Mars by his crew, he must find a way to overcome the impossible obstacles to try and survive. The witty and realistic dialogue found in the book translates perfectly on screen and the cast, which includes Matt Damon, Jessica Chastain, Sean Bean, and Chiwetel Ejiofor take you on a thrilling ride that is ambitious in scope but is also grounded in modern scientific ideas.

5. BRIDGE OF SPIES for the past 20 years Steven Spielberg as been on a directing streak the likes of which have never been accomplished before. His ability to tell human stories in his unique bigger than life way is on display again with Bridge of Spies. It is his fourth collaboration with Tom Hanks in the lead role and is about an unlikely character that oversees a prisoner exchange between the United States and the Soviet Union during the height of the Cold War.

4. ROOM Brie Larson is a sure bet for winning Best Actress in this independent adaptation based on Emma Donoghue’s novel of the same name. Larson play’s Ma, mother to her 5-year-old son Jack played by Jacob Tremblay. They have been held captive by an evil man in a tiny room for the entirety of Jacks life. The room is all he knows about the world, but now Jack is old enough to be a part of the escape plan.

3. SICARIO Denis Villeneuve is one of the most visionary filmmakers working today and his talents are once again fully exercised in his latest film Sicario. Set on the border between Mexico and the USA it features excellent work from Benicio Del Toro, Emily Blunt, Josh Brolin and cinematographer Roger Deakins.

2. EX MACHINA An immensely entertaining original movie by Alex Garland. Domhnall Gleeson and Oscar Issac are some of the best young talent showing up on screen these days, and it is an absolute joy to watch them go toe to toe with each other. Throw an outstanding performance by Alicia Vikander who plays an artificially intelligent robot, and a spectacular screenplay by Garland in there and you have yourself one of the absolute best films of the year.

1. INHERENT VICE It must be said that Inherent Vice did have a release at the very end of 2014 but was not released wide until January 9^th 2015 and did not have an international release until later that month so I am including it on this list. It is the latest by writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson and is based on the novel by Thomas Pynchon. It is a stoner detective story starring Joaquin Phoenix as Doc Sportello, a private investigator trying to locate an ex girlfriends lover. The plot takes you on some wild twists and turns but it is one of those movies that you have to let wash over you, taking it all in without worrying about getting lost in the details. The costumes, set design, music, and visuals are all mesmerizing and will leave you with a feeling of euphoria similar to what Doc is feeling throughout his many misadventures.