Movie Reviews – Page 104 – LFM: Libertas Film Magazine

Strong Faith and Hard Fists: LFM Reviews Manny

By Joe Bendel. Manny Pacquiao is hardly the world’s preeminent boxer-politician. Even if his first term in the Philippines’ congress had not been a bit of a “learning experience,” incumbent Kiev Mayor and Maidan supporter Vitali Klitschko would still easily hold that honor (maybe Sebastian Dehnhardt should consider a follow-up doc, soon). However, Pacquiao has become a Horatio Algerish icon for his countrymen, with good reason. Pacquiao’s remarkable success in the ring and his indomitable faith are chronicled in Leon Gast & Ryan Moore’s Manny, which opens this Friday in New York.

Pacquiao’s childhood was everything you would expect, except even more desperately poor. When children his age should have been in elementary school, he worked what jobs he could find and went without meals, so his mother and sisters could eat. Somehow fate delivered him into a boxing ring, where the scrawny kid ploughed through the considerably larger competition. Soon, the only place left for him to find fights was America. Again fate guided him to Freddie Roach’s gym, where the trainer and pugilist immediately clicked. He was not so fortunate with his early management, but that has to be the oldest story in boxing.

Presumably, it would take something special to get Gast to return to the ring, having already won an Oscar for When We Were Kings, considered by many the definitive boxing doc (though we’re obviously still partial to Klitschko), but it is easy to see what drew him to Pacquiao. The boxing congressman had at least two fights in 2011 worthy of Rocky II, one that he won but probably should have lost, and one that he lost but really should have won. Naturally, these bouts constitute a good portion of the film’s third act.

Such times would try many a man’s soul, but the glue holding together Pacquiao and his documentary profile is his devout Catholic faith. His sincerity comes through clearly and it is impressive. It might not be on their radar, but Manny is a film Catholic and evangelical audiences should adopt.

Of course, there are lighter moments too, including clips from Pacquiao’s grade Z Filipino action films. For some reason Jeremy Piven is one of several celebrity talking heads paying tribute to the fighter, but the choice of Liam Neeson to narrate makes considerably more sense. Frankly, he has the perfect voice for the job—sensitive, but undeniably badass. Hopefully, he also gave Pacquiao tips on choosing film projects, like say a thriller in which he is searching for a kidnapped loved one.

It almost feels like Manny ends before the big climatic pay-off, but it is still a compelling story of a rousing underdog life. There is good boxing material here, but it is just as much about faith and family. Recommended for sports fans and Christian viewers, Manny opens this Friday (1/23) in New York, at the AMC Empire.

LFM GRADE: B

Posted on January 20th, 2014 at 9:47pm.

LFM Reviews Son of a Gun

By Joe Bendel. There is a long cinematic tradition of gangsters and gunmen who were short of stature, but long on presence. Scottish Ewan McGregor follows in the footsteps of less than towering giants like Edward G. Robinson as hardboiled Australian lifer Brendan Lynch, delivering a batch of rather charismatic villainy in Julius Avery’s Son of a Gun, which opens this Friday in New York.

It is unclear whether J.R. and his feeble excuse for a moustache will survive prison, but his roommate is a certain goner. Attracting the unwelcomed attention of a hirsute biker rape gang, J.R. makes a deal for protection from Lynch and his associates. In return, once he is paroled, the kid will arrange the details of Lynch’s escape and serve as his management trainee assistant thereafter. Frankly, J.R. could use some direction, so this arrangement is win-win for him. Then he gets an eyeful of Tasha, one of the Russian women “kept” by Lennox, the Euro crime-boss, who finances Lynch’s operations.

Naturally, Lennox has a job for Lynch once he is at-large: an honest to gosh gold mine. The logistics will be a mess, but Lynch and his cronies need the money and are itching for action. After all, what could go wrong, aside from that thing with Tasha and Lynch’s generally erratic nature?

Son is a pretty entertaining little shoot ‘em up, almost entirely thanks to McGregor. Grizzled but wiry, he has the presence of a coiled spring, ready to launch at any moment. He seriously projects a sense of potential danger, making up for his lifeless appearance in Ossage County. Unfortunately, Brenton Thwaites could not possibly be any duller, truly fading into the background as the dumb and inexperienced J.R. Frankly, it is still unclear whether Alicia Viklander will really crossover. She seems uncomfortable vamping it up as a femme fatale, but her Tasha has enough intelligence and poise to totally out-class Thwaites.

Regardless, when Avery is getting down to criminal business, Son works pretty well. The escape sequence is impressively mounted and might just give other potential accomplices ideas. Likewise, the big heist also qualifies as well staged bedlam. However, during quieter times, the film is conspicuously over-written. Avery drives a bit about chimps and bonobo monkeys (decide which best represents your nature, padawan) so deeply into the ground, you’d think he was drilling for oil.

Son is never really surprising, per se, but it executes its crosses and double-crosses with admirable energy. Nobody is slacking off here, except maybe Thwaites’ facial hair, but McGregor truly takes possession of the film. We really haven’t seen him stretch out in this direction before, but he pulls it off. Recommended overall for fans of prison-heist-noir hybrids, Son of a Gun opens this Friday (1/23) in New York at the Quad Cinema.

LFM GRADE: B

Posted on January 20th, 2014 at 9:47pm.

LFM Reviews 20 Once Again

By Joe Bendel. Meng Li Jun is determined to bring back the Jackie-O bob and the spirit of sugary early 1960s pop. She might be cute enough to do it. Of course, she stills remembers when they were popular the first time around, when she was known as Shen Meng Jun. Shen will get a second chance at youth and the things that come with it in Leste Chen’s 20 Once Again, which opens this Friday in New York.

It is a mystical photo studio that spurs her youthful regeneration instead of a fortune telling machine, but you get the picture. She had wandered in to have her eventual funeral photo taken. Yes, she is in a martyring mood, but rather the opposite happens. Restored to the peak of her beauty, Shen still has all memories, including her loving favoritism for her would-be rocker grandson, Xiang Qian Jin. While she keeps her true identity secret, she does the only thing she can to help realize his dreams, joining the band as his girl-singer.

Naturally, he is quite taken with Meng/Shen, which is awkward, especially when their young media patron takes a shine to her. Further complicating matters, Shen’s old loyal companion-never-quite-lover is determined to woo the beauty he fell in love with decades ago.

If 20OA sounds familiar, beyond the obvious Big-18 Again comparisons, than you probably really know your Korean cinema. It is in fact a Mandarin language, Korean-Chinese co-produced re-conception of last year’s Korean monster hit, Miss Granny, helmed by the Taiwanese Chen, co-starring Luhan, a Chinese-born member of the K-pop boy band EXO. (His fans will probably dig his work here, but the rest of us innocent bystanders will be underwhelmed).

There are a lot of upbeat songs and candy colors in 20 2.0, but it is not all rainbows and buttercups. Naturally, it also indulges in a fair spot of sentiment. Yet, as on-guard as we should be for its heartstring pulling, Zhao Lixin delivers a doozey of a speech as Shen’s grown college professor son that will still kind of get to even relatively jaded viewers.

Nevertheless, it is Yang Zishan, the breakout star of Vicki Zhao Wei’s So Young, who is really running this show. Despite her flirty, pixie-like presence, she still projects Shen’s old, traditional soul. She honestly feels far older than she looks.

Whether you have seen Miss Granny or not, you should have a general idea where 20OA is headed. In addition to its cheesy songs, it has some nice moments celebrating the importance of family and an oddly effective lead performance from Yang Zishan. It is a modest yet manipulative film, but somehow still rather endearing nonetheless. Recommended for fans of light romantic fantasy and K-pop, 20 Once Again opens this Friday (1/16) in New York, at the AMC Empire.

LFM GRADE: B-

Posted on January 16th, 2015 at 12:58pm.

LFM Reviews I Touched All Your Stuff @ First Look 2015

By Joe Bendel. Strictly speaking, Christopher Kirk was not catfished or anything of the like. He knew the woman he called V. in the flesh, but she still played him for a sap. Truth is a slippery notion when it comes to their odd tale. One murky thing lead to another, resulting in a Brazilian prison sentence for Kirk. It is there María Bühler & Matias Mariani interviewed him for their documentary investigation-meditation I Touched All Your Stuff, which screens during the Museum of the Moving Image’s 2015 First Look (this year’s coverage is brought to you by the letter “I”).

Blame Pablo Escobar or maybe Keith Olbermann. Even if they are not directly at fault, they make the story even weirder. Kirk had done a number of interviews with media types like Olbermann after a house-sitting friend wrapped everything in his apartment with aluminum foil (leaving a note with the titular taunt). Kirk had already grown weary of the rat race (seriously, as an IT guy in Olympia, Washington?), so on a half-planned whim, he set off to visit a buddy in Colombia and see Pablo Escobar’s hippos. As the last remnant of the drug lord’s private wildlife park, the transplanted hippopotamus colony has grown and thrived in their new Colombian climate. At least things turned out well for them.

Kirk lost interest in the hippos when he met V., a more demur and studious acquaintance of his buddy’s party girl friends. Half Japanese and half Colombian, she is by all accountants quite stunning, but viewers will not know for certain, because every surviving picture of her is blurrier than the average Big Foot photo. Of course, that is also part of the film’s intrigue.

For a while Kirk and V maintained a pretty heavy long-distance relationship. Yet, in retrospect, Kirk identifies odd little moments he should have paid more attention to. Regardless, he could not ignore the suspicious circumstances when he started meeting her dodgy friends. Still, she kept him on the hook, because of obvious reasons.

Kirk is a natural born story teller and Bühler & Mariani have a keen sense of the film’s narrative structure, allowing the strangeness to steadily escalate. However, viewers should be cautioned not to emotionally invest in Kirk as a tragic protagonist. After all, he is in prison for something.

Stuff is the darnedest doc. Bühler & Mariani do not exactly connect every dot in V and Kirk’s mysterious lives, but the combination of what they know for sure and their working assumptions feels like ninety percent of the truth. Of course, that confounding ten percent is what fascinates and nags at the viewer.

There are probably a few too many scenes of skype and IM chats in Stuff, but its inherent mysteries and general attitude are quite compelling. Consider it a post-modern excursion into true crime or a documented urban legend. All that’s missing is a man with a hook. Highly recommended, I Touched All Your Stuff screens this Friday (1/16), as part of this year’s First Look at MoMI in Astoria, Queens.

LFM GRADE: A-

Posted on January 16th, 2015 at 12:58pm.

LFM Reviews I for Iran @ MoMA’s First Look 2015

I COMME IRAN de Sanaz Azari | CVB AUTEUR | BANDE-ANNONCE from CVB-VIDEP on Vimeo.

By Joe Bendel. You can find some rather unpleasant images and references in the text books of post-Islamic Revolutionary Iran. Nobody understands that better than an Iranian-Persian filmmaker’s Persian tutor. However, he still uses a problematic text due to a lack of better options. His language lessons will illuminate deeper truths in Sanaz Azari’s I for Iran, which screens during the Museum of the Moving Image’s 2015 First Look.

Azari was born in Iran, but lived in Brussels since early childhood. As a result, she did not speak Persian until she enrolled in classes as an adult. During her studies, she was struck by the way language carries cultural specific codes and meanings. This was particularly so with respects to Persia and Iranian identity, even and especially following the revolution. As he bemoans their textbook, Behrouz Majidi will expound on the beauties and ironies of Persian culture in a series of improvised lectures.

That might sound rather academic, but Majidi is the sort of screen presence who could read the Brussels phone book and keep the audience riveted. His delivery is sort of like vintage Mark Twain—drily witty and deceptively elliptical. Just when you think he is hopelessly off point, he brings each mini-monologue home with panache. At times he waxes nostalgic for lost Iranian treasures, like the storied Shirazi wine the Islamist government has long since forbidden. When he addresses current events, such as the 2013 presidential elections, his analysis also sounds pretty darn spot-on.

Unfortunately, that means Majidi is more of a realist than an optimist. However, his love for Persian culture and nostalgia for the Iran that once was is wholly engaging and at times quite touching. In between his improvised riffs, Azari presents a sort of visual free association based on the particular Persian letter under discussion. Frankly, these seem to work better over time, with the latter chain of images taking on far more evident meaning. Still, for the most part, they just take viewers away from the heart of the film.

I for Iran might sound simple and in terms of its formal structure it certainly is. However, despite its mere fifty minute running time, it overflows with thoughtful insights on human nature and grand themes like freedom, cultural survival, and human dignity. For such an unassuming film, it really sticks with viewers. Even though it is hard to define its cinematic category and the exact nature of Majidi’s performance, it still ought to be a star-making turn. Surprisingly moving, I for Iran is very highly recommended when it screens this Saturday (1/17), with the equally difficult to classify International Tourism as part of this year’s First Look at MoMI.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on January 14th, 2015 at 11:10pm.

LFM Reviews Vice

By Joe Bendel. Evidently, Michael Crichton gave humanity too much credit in Westworld. Instead of using cutting edge android technology to facilitate adventures in the Old West and ancient Rome, Julian Michaels has built a Vegas-style resort, where rich pervs can commit sex crimes with impunity. However, when one android-resident escapes into the real world, her programmers will pull out all the stops to recapture her in Brian A. Miller’s Vice, which opens this Friday in New York.

Like Kenny on South Park, pretty much every night Kelly and her friend Melissa are killed by a guest. Their memories are wiped and their bodies are repaired, so they can be reactivated a few days later. This time, Michaels expedites the process, to cater to a big hedge fund party. Seriously, someone at his level should not be micromanaging this sort of day-to-day business. Regardless, they put a rush on Kelly’s maintenance, leaving behind memories that understandably alarm her. Not inclined to go back for more such treatment, she escapes from the resort-compound.

Naturally, Michaels wants her back ASAP, but he does not want the cops involved, particularly not his nemesis, Roy Tedeschi. The world weary detective blames Vice for stirring up bad impulses that then spill over onto his streets. Despite the risk to his career, he has made it his business to antagonize Michaels. He and Kelly really ought to get together, as you know they must eventually.

There are an awful lot of stupid decisions and unnecessary villainy coming from Michaels and his associates. Pedantically speaking, there really ought to be multiply-redundant safeguards in place to avoid a situation like this—embarrassing, but probably not illegal. Needless to say, Vice is a pale shadow compared to Crichton’s Westworld and it suffers from the lack of a heavy comparable to Yul Brynner’s gunslinger. Still, it delivers a reasonable mix of trashy entertainment through its credible near future world-building and voyeurism dressed up as moral righteousness.

As a mid-January release, it is probably safe to say Vice is not destined to be a major awards player, but at least none of the primary cast-members embarrass themselves. Ambyr Childers is not half bad portraying Kelly’s slow process of self-assertion. Likewise, Thomas Jane is sufficiently hardnosed as Tedeschi and Bruce Willis chews on a fair amount of scenery as Michaels. Charlotte Kirk also makes the most of her limited screen time as the perennially ill-fated Melissa. Frankly, both Childers and Jane easily exceed expectations. It is just too bad Andre Fabrizio & Jeremy Passmore’s script is so derivative and uninspired.

Indeed, Vice is the sort of film you want to rewrite as you watch it. The whole concept of the Vice resort ought to be a launching pad for some clever social commentary, but like its creepy clientele, it just brings out the worst in its screenwriters. Still, everyone whose face is on the poster gives it a fair try. It is diverting enough if you enjoy B-movies, but anyone primarily intrigued by the premise should catch up with the Crichton film instead. For those looking for some slightly lurid, light-on-the-technical-stuff science fiction, Vice opens this Friday (1/16) in New York, at the Cinema Village.

LFM GRADE: C+

Posted on January 14th, 2015 at 11:10pm.