Watching movies: "Boy Erased," "Creed II," "Eighth Grade," "Sorry To Bother You"
Notes on a few recent screen titles:
"Boy Erased," written and directed by Joel Edgerton (who also plays a supporting role), is a wrenching look at the effects of kindly-intentioned intolerance. The result, in this case of gay-conversion "therapy," is not kind; in fact, it is devastating in this adaptation of the memoir by Garrard Conley. But what makes it especially horrifying is that the process is abetted by two loving parents (Russell Crowe and Nicole Kidman) who want the best for their son (Lucas Hedges) -- but do not believe that the best includes his being gay. They send him off to a gay-conversion program and, as I said, it not only proves unhelpful, it is a horror for the young people forced to endure it.
There is no true psychological knowledge at work in the camp, only a sense that Satan and a half-assed distillation of Freudian theory are at work in "choosing" to be gay. It's a fine, infuriating film, at once personal and issues based in a way that the best network TV movies used to be (when such movies were still being made), Hedges is excellent, and Kidman -- who's been on a real roll of late in her work -- wonderfully embodies the struggle between parental love and ingrained, wrongheaded dogma.
"Creed II" is not quite on the level with "Creed," which ably moved the "Rocky" saga into another generation. But as directed by Steven Caple Jr. (who also did the fine, Cleveland-set film "The Land") "Creed II" has the grittiness that at times was lost from the "Rocky" films and a strong portrayal of individual characters. In "Creed II," even the villains are allowed their pain. The film is most closely tied to "Rocky IV," in which Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) battled Russian behemoth Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren) after Drago killed Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers) in what was supposed to be an exhibition fight. "Creed II" again brings us Apollo's son Adonis (Michael B. Jordan), who with Rocky's help has risen through the fight ranks but is now challenged by Drago's son Viktor (Florian Munteanu), who has been boxing his way out of the nowhere life Ivan was exiled to following his loss to Rocky.
There are loops within loops of parents and children here: Adonis and the image of his father; Adonis and his surrogate father, Rocky; Ivan and Viktor; Rocky and memories of his estranged son Robert; Adonis and his adoptive mother Mary Anne (Phylicia Rashad); Adonis and Amara, his newborn daughter with Bianca (Tessa Thompson). There are also loops in the "Rocky" saga, elements in the script (with the story credit to Cheo Hodari Coker) carry echoes not only of "Rocky IV" but of the third, fifth and sixth films. Of course, there are also fights. And it all works as a decent addition to the Rocky canon. Jordan knows how to convey both rage and pain; Stallone has a firm grip on the aged Rocky; Thompson is very good, and even Lundgren gets some decent scenes.
By the way, Jordan has had a pretty fine year with both this and "Black Panther," and Thompson has been seemingly everywhere, including the intriguingly weird "Sorry to Bother You" from writer-director Boots Riley. Lakeith Stanfield ("Atlanta") stars as Cassius Green, whose job prospects are so poor that he fakes his resume -- to get a telemarketing job. Even though his scam is transparent, he gets the job, slowly learns how to succeed (for instance, with a "white voice" while pitching product) and gets promoted to a creepier telemarketing level where his assignment involves rounding up buyers for a company distributing slave labor. Cassius loves the big money but his conscience keeps getting prodded by co-workers who can barely make ends meet and are unionizing, and his artist-activist girlfriend (Thompson). In addition, his business rise exposes him to the dirtiest secrets in his business, one of which is a hugely startling surprise.
Riley does a nice job of presenting a futuristic society that seems all too plausible in the shadow of Trump World -- and Armie Hammer deftly plays a corporate bigwig who is not only amoral but perfectly comfortable saying so. There are a couple of nice plot turns near the end, although the finale is rather wobbly,
Stanfield also has had other credits of late, including "The Girl in The Spider's Web," which I aim to include in another post.
I have no previous knowledge of Elsie Fisher, the engagingly awkward Kayla Day in "Eighth Grade," a recent film by writer-director Bo Burnham. (Side note: I saw "Creed II" and "Boy Erased" in theaters, "Sorry To Bother You" and "Eighth Grade" on disc.) Fisher is so natural, so unaffected in the film following Kayla in the waning days of her eighth grade, that she is a perfect fit for the movie itself. This seeks no redemptive ending, no revenge against mean girls, no big round of applause for Kayla in a contrived climax. "Eighth Grade" is much more about figuring out what you are, with considerable difficulty and not much outside help. That's not a unique problem for Kayla -- others stumble as much as she does, and I had more than a few flashbacks to my own eighth-grade clumsiness. But in its refusal to be anything more than an unblinking slice of a young life, "Eighth Grade" is more than admirable; while it's tempting to liken it to "Lady Bird," "Eighth Grade" stands on its own, comfortable in its main character's discomfort.
"Boy Erased," written and directed by Joel Edgerton (who also plays a supporting role), is a wrenching look at the effects of kindly-intentioned intolerance. The result, in this case of gay-conversion "therapy," is not kind; in fact, it is devastating in this adaptation of the memoir by Garrard Conley. But what makes it especially horrifying is that the process is abetted by two loving parents (Russell Crowe and Nicole Kidman) who want the best for their son (Lucas Hedges) -- but do not believe that the best includes his being gay. They send him off to a gay-conversion program and, as I said, it not only proves unhelpful, it is a horror for the young people forced to endure it.
There is no true psychological knowledge at work in the camp, only a sense that Satan and a half-assed distillation of Freudian theory are at work in "choosing" to be gay. It's a fine, infuriating film, at once personal and issues based in a way that the best network TV movies used to be (when such movies were still being made), Hedges is excellent, and Kidman -- who's been on a real roll of late in her work -- wonderfully embodies the struggle between parental love and ingrained, wrongheaded dogma.
"Creed II" is not quite on the level with "Creed," which ably moved the "Rocky" saga into another generation. But as directed by Steven Caple Jr. (who also did the fine, Cleveland-set film "The Land") "Creed II" has the grittiness that at times was lost from the "Rocky" films and a strong portrayal of individual characters. In "Creed II," even the villains are allowed their pain. The film is most closely tied to "Rocky IV," in which Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) battled Russian behemoth Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren) after Drago killed Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers) in what was supposed to be an exhibition fight. "Creed II" again brings us Apollo's son Adonis (Michael B. Jordan), who with Rocky's help has risen through the fight ranks but is now challenged by Drago's son Viktor (Florian Munteanu), who has been boxing his way out of the nowhere life Ivan was exiled to following his loss to Rocky.
There are loops within loops of parents and children here: Adonis and the image of his father; Adonis and his surrogate father, Rocky; Ivan and Viktor; Rocky and memories of his estranged son Robert; Adonis and his adoptive mother Mary Anne (Phylicia Rashad); Adonis and Amara, his newborn daughter with Bianca (Tessa Thompson). There are also loops in the "Rocky" saga, elements in the script (with the story credit to Cheo Hodari Coker) carry echoes not only of "Rocky IV" but of the third, fifth and sixth films. Of course, there are also fights. And it all works as a decent addition to the Rocky canon. Jordan knows how to convey both rage and pain; Stallone has a firm grip on the aged Rocky; Thompson is very good, and even Lundgren gets some decent scenes.
By the way, Jordan has had a pretty fine year with both this and "Black Panther," and Thompson has been seemingly everywhere, including the intriguingly weird "Sorry to Bother You" from writer-director Boots Riley. Lakeith Stanfield ("Atlanta") stars as Cassius Green, whose job prospects are so poor that he fakes his resume -- to get a telemarketing job. Even though his scam is transparent, he gets the job, slowly learns how to succeed (for instance, with a "white voice" while pitching product) and gets promoted to a creepier telemarketing level where his assignment involves rounding up buyers for a company distributing slave labor. Cassius loves the big money but his conscience keeps getting prodded by co-workers who can barely make ends meet and are unionizing, and his artist-activist girlfriend (Thompson). In addition, his business rise exposes him to the dirtiest secrets in his business, one of which is a hugely startling surprise.
Riley does a nice job of presenting a futuristic society that seems all too plausible in the shadow of Trump World -- and Armie Hammer deftly plays a corporate bigwig who is not only amoral but perfectly comfortable saying so. There are a couple of nice plot turns near the end, although the finale is rather wobbly,
Stanfield also has had other credits of late, including "The Girl in The Spider's Web," which I aim to include in another post.
I have no previous knowledge of Elsie Fisher, the engagingly awkward Kayla Day in "Eighth Grade," a recent film by writer-director Bo Burnham. (Side note: I saw "Creed II" and "Boy Erased" in theaters, "Sorry To Bother You" and "Eighth Grade" on disc.) Fisher is so natural, so unaffected in the film following Kayla in the waning days of her eighth grade, that she is a perfect fit for the movie itself. This seeks no redemptive ending, no revenge against mean girls, no big round of applause for Kayla in a contrived climax. "Eighth Grade" is much more about figuring out what you are, with considerable difficulty and not much outside help. That's not a unique problem for Kayla -- others stumble as much as she does, and I had more than a few flashbacks to my own eighth-grade clumsiness. But in its refusal to be anything more than an unblinking slice of a young life, "Eighth Grade" is more than admirable; while it's tempting to liken it to "Lady Bird," "Eighth Grade" stands on its own, comfortable in its main character's discomfort.
Comments
Post a Comment