Movie Review Greta

Greta (2019) 

Directed by Neil Jordan 

Written by Ray Wright, Neil Jordan

Starring Chloe Grace Moretz, Isabelle Huppert, Maika Monroe, Colm Feore, Stephen Rea

Release Date March 1st, 2019

Published March 1st, 2019

Greta has the makings of a very good movie. The film was directed by Neil Jordan, the Irish auteur known for The Crying Game among a varied and daring nearly 30 year career. Greta stars 16 time Cesar nominee (Cesar=French Oscars) Isabelle Huppert and perennial rising star Chloe Grace Moretz, an actress seemingly always on the verge of a breakout role. So how did Greta go so very, very wrong? 

Greta is the name of the character played by Isabelle Huppert as a lonely, French widow living in New York City. One day, Greta leaves her purse on the subway and it is found by Frances (Moretz) who kindly returns the bag and its contents. Frances is treated as some small town hick in New York despite being from the small town of Boston which is like any homey backwater I guess. Is Neil Jordan so up on the New York-Boston rivalry that this portrayal is intentional satire? 

Anyway, my digression aside, Frances returns the bag and finds herself taken by Greta’s sadness and loneliness. She takes pity on the old woman and offers to go dog shopping with her. This turns into repeated dinners at Greta’s home and lengthy, intimate confessions about Greta’s failed relationship with her real life daughter and Frances’ pain over losing her mother and her strained relationship with her father, played by Colm Feore. 

One night, as Frances is helping set up for yet another dinner at Greta’s house, she finds a cabinet filled with purses, each with names and phone numbers attached and the same forms of identification inside. This is a quick indicator that Greta doesn’t just happen to meet people, she leaves these bags places with the intent of having a kind hearted person return them so that she makes a new friend. 

It’s really sad and pathetic but Frances, as if she has read the script ahead of time, reacts as if what Greta did was sinister. Of course, we know that it indeed was sinister but when you look at it just from the information Frances has, it’s merely a pathetic cry for help. Frances acts as if the bags are evidence that Greta is a serial killer. Instead of confronting Greta about what she found she sets about faking an illness and then sets about ghosting the old lady and not returning her calls. 

Greta doesn’t take this well and the thriller plot begins to kick in with Greta as the motherly version of Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction and that dog that she and Frances bought together playing the role of the rabbit. Greta begins showing up at Frances’ work and at her apartment and even after Frances calls the cop, Greta keeps upping the crazy by following Frances’s best friend Erica (Maika Monroe) while sending creeper photos to Frances. 

These scenes aren’t entirely ineffective but Isabelle Huppert isn’t exactly Max Cady from Cape Fear. Greta is strange and creepy but not menacing. You feel like she could be mollified with the promise of an occasional phone call and a casual lunch. Again, that’s as portrayed in the movie, only the marketing has given us any indication that Greta is crazier than what is portrayed in the movie. Only the film score attempts to push us toward genuinely fearing Greta but Isabelle Huppert doesn’t do much helping with that with her docile performance. 

Docile until she gets her big “I will not be ignored” moment late in the movie but even that moment isn’t notably energetic. The third act of Greta embraces the crazy a little but not in very convincing fashion. Greta goes predictably where you think it was going from the trailer and abuses the kinds of cliches that movies like this always abuse. There is even a dead meat private detective character played by Stephen Rea who may as well have been named Max Plot Device. 

My biggest issue however, with Greta and Neil Jordan is not so much the thriller cliches of good characters making bad decisions or even annoying plot conveniences. The biggest problem is tone. More than once Greta leans a little toward the high level camp that could make the movie work and then pulls back. If Isabelle Huppert is going to play evil in such a mundane fashion the movie needs to find another way to be entertaining and the movie never finds that. The only believable thing about Greta would be embracing just how silly this all is and leaning into it in a darkly comic fashion and it never quite gets there. 

I’ve made allusions to Fatal Attraction in this review and while I am not a fan of that movie either, that film at least appeared to drift into camp with some intent. Glenn Close was believably batty but she was also unconcerned about how people would take her. There is something close to John Waters’ Divine from Female Troubles in the high level, over the top, that Close plays in that movie. Isabelle Huppert lacks the energy or nerve to really go for the campy, sleazy, silly that Greta needs to be more than cliche riddled, base, thriller. 

Sadly, what we get in Greta is a regrettably straight forward series of overly familiar cliches from similar thrillers about obsessive psychopaths. The only seeming innovation is the lack of a sexual component to the main relationship. Greta is not sexually interested in Frances and the film goes a long way to make sure we get that this is about being a mom and not about a psycho-sexual obsession. The crazy lesbian is the one cliche Greta thankfully avoids. 

Strangely, rather than a movie like Fatal Attraction, Neil Jordan’s own Interview with the Vampire is the movie that best presages Greta in presenting something that should be high camp but is played dreadfully and regrettably straight. That film, quite oddly, also features a strangely bloodless and mannerly approach to a parental psycho-obsession as Tom Cruise, rather than being sexually obsessed with Brad Pitt’s effete and pretty fellow vamp, is more mad that Pitt won’t play along with being his scion. 

Mannerly is a good way to describe Greta. Yes, this is a movie about a psycho stalker but it is going to be decent and respectable about that plot in a way that deflates the movie. Bloodless, for the most part, and with a lead performance with the restraint of a Nun, Greta is a bizarre watch. The score appears to be the only part of the movie that embraces what this movie should be. The film score is filled with moody stabs and atmosphere that is lacking from the performances.  

Movie Review Kick Ass

Kick Ass (2010) 

Directed by Matthew Vaughn

Written by Jane Goldman, Matthew Vaughn

Starring Aaron Taylor Johnson, Chloe Grace Moretz, Christopher Mintz Plasse, Nicolas Cage 

Release Date April 16th, 2010 

Published April 16th, 2010 

Few movie titles are as fitting as Kick Ass, Indeed the movie does kick ass, balls, teeth and anything else that can be kicked. Also stabbed, shot and variously eviscerated. Director Matthew Vaughn set out for comic book carnage and delivers big time and along the way he gives us characters we like and come to care about even as they are greatly exaggerated, comic book versions of real people.

Aaron Johnson stars in Kick Ass as Dave Lizewski, a teenager who claims that his only superpower is being invisible to girls. Dave longs to be a costumed hero fighting crime and protecting the innocent. Since Dave is subject to harassment and even crime on a regular basis his feelings make sense.

After being robbed by thugs Dave makes up his mind to give the superhero thing a shot. Thus, Dave buys a green and yellow wetsuit and a pair of sticks wrapped green and begins his superhero career by getting stabbed and hit by a car. Several months of recovery later Dave does come away with a minor superpower, nerve damage that allows him to take a better beating.

Get a beating he does but a cell phone video showing him getting knocked around but continuing to fight and defend a downed man makes him a star and eventually a target for a mob boss who mistakenly believes Kick Ass is disrupting his business. As it turns out, another pair of costumed heroes, Big Daddy (Nicolas Cage) and his daughter Hit Girl (Chloe Moretz) have been targeting the mob boss and are killing his men.

Where the story goes from there I will leave you to discover. I can tell you it's a fun, if slightly overlong, ride filled with ass kicking violence and some shocking laughs, mostly, and controversially, supplied by Chloe Moretz's ingenious Hit Girl. At a mere 11 years old when the film was made, Moretz shocks and appalls with her language and taste for severe violence.

Many of my fellow critics are terribly uncomfortable about Hit Girl. Her age and propensity for harsh, bloody vengeance gives them pause and many find it reprehensible. For me, the action fit the character and while I may take issue with such a young girl in amongst such brutally violent acts, I cannot say I wasn't entertained.

Matthew Vaughn and his young star never flinch from the violence or the character's vulnerability. In the end, during the controversial final showdown, that vulnerability played against a comic book hero's sense of invulnerability raises the stakes and gives the audience an extra jolt ahead of the killer finale.

Should someone as young as Chloe Moretz play a character as morally compromised, violent and fetishized as Hit Girl? Maybe not, but try not to be entertained by how well she plays this character, it's impossible. This kid has so much talent that you cannot help wanting to forgive the movie 's many sins because you enjoy her so much. It's transgressive in the best possible way. 

As for the rest of the cast, Nicolas Cage delivers yet another of his wonderfully off-beat characters. Driven by a need for violent revenge, Cage's Big Daddy plays as a mixture of Cage's typically manic action movie characters with bits of the nerdier or dopier aspects of his comic characters. It's a brilliant mix and Cage's wild energy during action scenes is incredibly entertaining. Cage brings a chaos to the movie that stands out even among the chaos intended in Kick Ass. 

Aaron Johnson has a difficult task in playing Kick Ass as an action hero and as an overmatched kid in way over his head. Audiences want to see him in action but the character isn't necessarily up to it and that creates a clever twist on the comic book hero that Johnson plays well. Johnson is even better in the romantic subplot that has him pretending to be gay to get close to the girl of his dreams, Lyndsey Fonseca.

Edgy has become a cliché but it seems an apt way to describe the delicate balance of offensiveness, humor and excitement that is Kick Ass. Campy yet violent, offensive yet shockingly entertaining, Kick Ass quite simply Kicks Ass.

Movie Review Suspiria

Suspiria (2018) 

Directed by Luca Guadagnino 

Written by David Kajganich

Starring Dakota Johnson, Tilda Swinton, Chloe Grace Moretz,Mia Goth, Angela Winkler

Release Date October 26th, 2018 

Published December 15th, 2018

I’m embarrassed to say that I am completely defeated by Suspiria. I have no idea what this movie is intending to say. I recognize that the filmmaking is lush and gorgeous and a few scenes in the movie are striking and memorable, but I cannot, for the life of me, find a point in the fine filmmaking. Suspiria isn’t scary enough for full on horror, despite some high level gore, and it doesn’t appear to have much of a political message. So what the hell did I just watch? 

Suspiria stars Dakota Johnson as Susie Bannion, a former Quaker turned wannabe dancer who has moved to Berlin to study under the famed Madame Blanc (Tilda Swinton). Susie has done this on spec, she is not even guaranteed the chance to try out. The school year has already begun and there may not even be space. But, Susie takes the chance nevertheless and something in her dance strikes a chord so deep in Madame Blanc that Susie earns her way in. 

Meanwhile, in a prologue, we’ve met Patricia (Chloe Grace Moretz), a deeply troubled young girl who is visiting her psychiatrist, Dr Klemperer (also played by Tilda Swinton under heavy and convincing, old man makeup). The doctor believes that Patricia’s rants about witches at her dance school, the same one that Susie is to attend, are delusions. However, when Patricia goes missing, Dr Klemperer is forced to look at her delusions in a different manner. 

Caught in the midst of all of this, the disappearance of Patricia and the arrival of Susie, is Sara (Mia Goth). Sara was Patricia’s closest friend and has been tasked by Madame Blanc with helping Susie get situated, in Patricia’s former room no less. Sara slowly becomes suspicious and her suspicions drive much of the plot in the second act or is it the 4th? The film is divided into multiple parts with a prologue and an epilogue and an epic length, nearly an hour longer than Dario Argento’s original Suspiria. 

The style of Suspiria is top notch. The gorgeous deep focus cinematography of Call Me By Your Name cinematographer, Sayombhu Mukdeeprom takes a few notes from Argento’s original, especially with the use of the color red, but has its own unique beauty in the remarkable angles and striking use of light and dark. I have no problems whatsoever with the technical side of director Luca Guadagnino’s production. 

The issues in Suspiria arise when I attempt to bring the film into some kind of greater focus. I am trying to extract a point. One fellow critic I read said the decision to set the film in Berlin, the original was set in Freiburg, Germany, was intended to evoke the division of the city after World War 2 juxtaposed with the division of the self, i.e the public and the private, the duality at the heart of so many of us, the side we show others and the side we keep to ourselves. 

I kind of see that but it doesn’t help me understand the film's final act of blood and dance. I genuinely have no clue what happened in the final act of the movie. I could describe it in full spoiler mode because I don’t know what I would be spoiling if anything. The final blood-soaked scenes are striking but what they have to do with anything either in the story the film is telling in text or metaphorically in subtext. 

I’m embarrassed because I am usually rather adept at sussing out metaphors and deeper meanings, it’s kind of my thing. If I can’t suss one directly, I can usually assign one but for the life of me, I can’t figure out what Suspiria is intended to say about women, sexuality, dance, or witches. Maybe it’s not intended to mean anything and is just an experiment in form. If that’s the case, it’s not very clear from the characters who seem to be striding toward some kind of point, even if I can’t seem to follow it. 

Movie Review Let Me In

Let Me In (2010)

Directed by Matt Reeves

Written by Matt Reeves

Starring Kodi Smit-McPhee, Chloe Grace Moretz, Elias Koteas, Richard Jenkins

Release Date October 1st, 2010

Published October 1st, 2010

As I watched the American re-imagining of the Swedish vampire movie “Let The Right One In,” re-titled “Let Me In,” a pair of troglodytic morons giggled at things that frankly should not have elicited such school girl glee. They giggled when Chloe Moretz as the 12 year old starving vampire leapt upon her pray. They giggled when her non-vamp caretaker Richard Jenkins committed murder on her behalf. And, most disturbingly, they giggled during a touching scene of innocence, kindness and tender pre-teen romance.

Were they right? Was I wrong for taking it all too seriously? I found director Matt Reeves take on stark Swedish horror to be at once moving and terrifying. The young stars Chloe Moretz and Kodi Smit McPhee lured me in with their innocence and devastated me with their kindness, strength and for Moretz her stunning tendency for great violence, the same tendency that ironically played perfectly for giggles in the action flick “Kick Ass.”

”Let Me In” stars Kodi Smit McPhee as Owen, the son of an alcoholic mother and an absent father. Owen is picked on repeatedly at school and has no friends. His only comfort seems to come from stealing money from his mother to buy candy, specifically Now & Laters. He is alone until a strange girl named Abby (Moretz) moves in next door.

Abby first tells Owen that they cannot be friends. Soon, however, she is spending time with him and they develop a system of talking to each other through the walls of their neighboring apartments. Strangely, Abby is only seen at night. She walks in the snow with no shoes and does not get cold. The man who Owen believes is Abby's father (Richard Jenkins) keeps odd hours and odd habits. All of these traits add up to an undeniable truth but Owen keeps that far from his mind as he basks in the attention he cannot get from parents or school.

What begins as a modest friendship develops into a touching pre-teen romance and as Owen covets Abby's attention and she is caring. She recognizes Owen's pain and aims to protect him. The scenes laying out this unique and fascinating relationship unfold with care and calm juxtaposed against scenes in which 'the father' attempts to acquire Abby's needed sustenance, scenes filled with chaos and fear.

Remakes are as a rule a bad idea but writer-director Matt Reeves (Cloverfield) cleverly works around the perils of the remake by casting Moretz and McPhee whose work nearly made me forget the excellent work of the young Swedish stars of Let the Right One In. Moretz and McPhee have a magical chemistry that mixes innocence and intelligence, fear and mistrust with wanting and a desire to connect. It's a remarkable thing for two so young to be both worldly and guileless.

The casting is the key in “Let Me In” and Moretz and McPhee are matched perfectly by veteran supporting actors Richard Jenkins and Elias Koteas who plays a police inspector on the trail of 'the father' and on the verge of finding Abby and her terrifying secret. Koteas is brilliant in a minimalist performance that could be mistaken for being one note with how calm he remains but is in fact the pulsing heart of the film, especially as he gets closer to discovering Abby.

Let Me In is stunningly violent at times and shockingly calm and observant at others. It is a wonder of strong direction and killer performances that will frighten, amuse and move a willing audience. It may be arrogant on my part but those two giggling fools were wrong, this film deserves a serious audience, one that pays it the proper attention. Those that do will be rewarded with one of the finest dramatic, gothic horror films of the past decade.

Movie Review: Big Momma's House 2

Big Momma's House 2 (2006) 

Directed by John Whitesell

Written by Don Rhymer 

Starring Martin Lawrence, Nia Long, Dan Lauria, Kat Dennings, Chloe Grace Moretz, Zachary Levi 

Release Date January 27th, 2006 

Published January 26th, 2006 

2000's Big Momma's House helped to establish Martin Lawrence's star credentials. Unfortunately for Martin it was his last hit as a solo act. Bad Boys 2 owes far more to audience love for Will Smith than for anything Lawrence brought to the table. So, given a string of massive bombs on his resume, it comes as no surprise that Lawrence would make a return to trip to Big Momma's House.

What is surprising, however, is how pleasant--even occasionally funny--that return is. Don't get me wrong, Big Momma's House 2 is not a very good movie, but it is a passable bit of entertainment for very forgiving audiences.

Since we last saw FBI agent Malcolm Turner (Martin Lawrence), he has married Sherrie (Nia Long), the woman whose life he saved by posing as her Big Momma six years ago, and settled into a comfortable desk job. His new duties are far less dangerous than undercover work and include dressing up as an eagle to teach safety classes to school children, as we see in a cute opening sequence that has Malcolm lighting himself on fire while teaching kids fire safety.

Soon however, Malcolm is desperate to get back in the field. His former partner, no longer played by Paul Giamatti, has been killed in the line of duty and Malcolm wants the case. His boss (Dan Lauria) refuses to let him in but of course, as the plot insists, Malcolm will not be denied.

The investigation requires sending an undercover agent into the home of a computer software designer and his family as a nanny. Lucky for Malcolm, he has just the nanny to fit the job. Pulling his Big Momma mask and fat suit out of storage, Malcolm embeds himself; deep cover into a case involving corrupt software designers and a virus that could endanger national security.

Do not trouble yourself with the plot of Big Momma's House 2 because the film never troubles itself with the plot. The whole software/computer virus is merely the mcguffin. It's a reason to get Martin Lawrence back in his Big Momma disguise, dispensing off-color wisdom and, in this cleaned up family sequel, helping the children of this very uptight famly to loosen up and have more fun.

There is nothing original in the film's life lessons and family values storyline so you're left to watch Lawrence, who mugs with fury and somehow manages to find a big laugh here and there. Forget about the ridiculous suit. There is no way anyone bought it the first time around, and as Big Momma parades about in swimwear and cheerleader outfits, they certainly won't buy it this time. What you can buy into, however, is Lawrence's comic talent which, even in his worst films has shown through occasionally, and is in full view here.

I wouldn't call anything in Big Momma's House 2 clever, but some of it is pretty funny and that falls entirely to Martin Lawrence. Returning to the kind of broad comic performance that made him a star, Lawrence has his confidence and charm back. Since all of the laughs in Big Momma's House 2 rely on Lawrence's hard work and comic talent, having him at his cocky confident best is essential and the film works, in it's way, because of that.

There is nothing special about Big Momma's House 2, but get Martin Lawrence in that fat suit, maybe slip a swim suit over the top of it, throw in some fat jokes and some southern fried common sense and you get Big Momma.  It's a character that establishes its own level of reality--if you are willing to take on the herculean task of suspending disbelief.

For family audiences, Big Momma's House 2 is the kind of movie that kids will enjoy and mom and dad won't be bored by. Go in with low expectations and you may find yourself reasonably well entertained. Though the film is PG-13 for some occasionally raunchy humor, it's rare and nothing terribly offensive. Mom and dad can take the kids to see it without fear.

It's not for everybody, but fans of Martin Lawrence and the very forgiving amongst us will find more than a few big laughs in Big Momma's House 2.

Movie Review Hugo

Hugo (2011) 

Directed by Martin Scorsese

Written by John Logan 

Starring Asa Butterfield, Chloe Grace Moretz, Ben Kingsley, Sacha Baron Cohen

Release Date November 23rd, 2011 

Published 10-25-2023

Imagine for a moment Martin Scorsese taking you aside to tell you why he loves the movies. Not only does Martin Scorsese tell you why he loves movies, he tells you via a fable about a child, a mechanized figure and legendary French director George Melies. If you're like me then this scenario sounds like bliss and "Hugo" is indeed a blissful experience. Through the much maligned form of the family movie Martin Scorsese has offered to fans an education in the magic of the movie and a wonderful adventure that will undoubtedly delight the whole family.

Hugo Cabret (Asa Butterfield) lost his father (Jude Law) at a very young age. The tragedy is still fresh when we meet Hugo while he runs about fixing the clocks inside a French train station. The clocks had been the purview of Hugo's drunken, loutish Uncle (a barely recognizable Ray Winstone); Hugo took over when his Uncle disappeared.

Hugo has subsisted for some time without adult supervision. His means of gathering provisions is to steal them; something that has him on the radar of the train station's nasty head of security (Sascha Baron Cohen). Hugo steals more than just food however and it's on a non-food related excursion that Hugo comes close to getting caught.

Hugo has only one possession, a strange robot-like figure that is nearly as big as he is. This automaton, as his father had called it, was likely once owned by a strange old magician and assisted with fabulous stage theatrics. Hugo is convinced that if he can fix the automaton that it may be the key to a message from his late father.

While trying to steal parts for his automaton Hugo crosses the toy shop operator, Mr. George (Ben Kingsley). As punishment Mr. George takes Hugo's beloved notebook that once belonged to Hugo's father. In order to get it back Hugo enlists the help of Mr. George's adopted God-Daughter, Isabelle (Chloe Moretz) and together they begin a grand adventure.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media