Movie Review My Sister's Keeper

My Sister's Keeper (2009) 

Directed by Nick Cassavetes 

Written by Jeremy Leven, Nick Cassavetes 

Starring Cameron Diaz, Abigail Breslin, Jason Patric, Alec Baldwin, Joan Cusack

Release Date June 26th, 2009

Published June 25th, 2009 

There is a serviceable Lifetime Movie somewhere in the dark morass of My Sister's Keeper. This weepie about a teen with terminal cancer and the familial strife surrounding that diagnosis is quite the tear puller. At times I actually felt as if the movie was attempting to extract the fluids from eyes by any means necessary but the tears never came.

Instead, there is a feeling of vast indifference tinged with the irritation at the varying attempts at manipulation. All movies are manipulative. The better movies hide their manipulations behind great drama, comedy, tragedy and various other implements of storytelling manipulation. My Sister's Keeper is much more naked in its pushy nature and that makes it off-putting.

Abigail Breslin, best known as the wonderful little pageant contestant from Little Miss Sunshine, stars in My Sister's Keeper as 11 year old Anna. Where most kids were the result of an accident or surprise, Anna was planned. Her parents, Sara (Cameron Diaz) and Brian (Jason Patric) had Anna as a way of saving the life of their cancer stricken daughter Kate (Sofia Vassilieva).

If you're overly movie literate you might start thinking about This Island Earth or The Island, sci-fi movies about people born in labs to be used as spare parts for rich counterparts. This is not science fiction. My Sister's Keeper is based in some real science. Through gene manipulation Anna was designed specifically with elements that could be helpful to Kate.

Now, with Kate nearing the end and needing a kidney transplant to buy a few more months, Anna says no. She hires an attorney she saw on TV, Campbell Alexander (Alec Baldwin) and sues for medical emancipation. Though she says it is her decision it's clear to us there is more to it. It's also clear that mom and dad are clueless as a function of the plot.

The pushy melodramatics of My Sister's Keeper serve to, at the very least, keep the melancholy at a distance. Take away all of the forced drama and what you are left with is a movie of a teenager dying of cancer. Not an unworthy story but not something that fits into the neat Hollywood box of melodramatic story manipulation.

Cancer seems too serious and too real for something as facile and tedious as the melodrama of My Sister's Keeper. Sofia Vassilieva does a tremendous job of making us feel for Kate but she is betrayed by a story and style that renders her a plot point in her own story.

Director Nick Cassavetes knows a little something about manipulative melodrama, he directed The Notebook. That film however hid the strings it pulled to get you to feel what it wanted you to feel. Was it pushy? Yes, but the sights and the romance hid that to a point and made tolerable the obvious contrivance of the story.

No such hiding in My Sister's Keeper. The movie exploits the teen with cancer conceit to score easy sympathy points as it pushes the audience from one emotional response to the next. That the film avoids becoming smarmy in its exploitation is a tribute to a talented if undermined cast.

My Sister's Keeper is an obvious, naked attempt at audience manipulation. Weak melodrama hidden behind the veil of disease of the week cynicism. It would be shameful if this talented cast weren't capable of making some of the material rise above the exploitation. In the end, My Sister's Keeper is merely a bad movie, just short of despicable.

Movie Review: Crazy as Hell

Crazy as Hell (2002) 

Directed by Eriq LaSalle

Written by Jeremy Leven

Starring Michael Beach, Eriq LaSalle, Ronny Cox 

Release Date September 27th, 2002 

Published November 4th, 2002 

For eight years, Eriq LaSalle was best known for his sullen brooding performance as Dr. Peter Benton on NBC's ER. His rare big screen appearances are highlighted by a fascinating turn in the race drama The Drop Squad. In his directorial debut in Crazy As Hell LaSalle let's his hair down and delivers an over-the-top take on religion and race in a mental hospital.

Crazy As Hell tells the story of controversial psychiatrist Dr. Ty Adams (Another former ER actor, Michael Beach,). His non-medical approach to therapy has lead to the death of two patients but has seemingly helped more than it has hurt. Dr. Adams arrives at Sedah Psychiatric Hospital to an unwelcome glare from the facilities boss Dr. Delazo (Ronny Cox). Not only does Dr. Delazo disagree with Dr. Adams's form of therapy he is also unhappy about a documentary crew that has been installed in the hospital for thirty days to document Dr. Adams's unusual treatment. The documentary crew is headed up by the very engaging John C. McGinley.

A short time after Dr. Adams arrival, a new patient arrives. The patient is a large intimidating man who claims to be Satan himself (LaSalle). Having checked himself into the hospital voluntarily, Satan is not initially one of the doctor's patients.

Dr. Adams meanwhile is haunted by his past in which his wife and child were murdered and he believes it was his fault. Adams is plagued by visions of his late wife and has animated conversations with her that is picked up by the documentary cameras.

Dr. Adams's treatments from the start are aimed at one patient named Cheryl (Tracy Petit). Cheryl is a paranoid schizophrenic who doesn't speak to anyone. While on medication she is sedate and quiet. However under Dr. Adams's treatments, Cheryl is a screaming crying mess that refuses to leave her room. Despite Delazo's worries, she does begin to show some slow improvement. However, the little improvement that Dr. Adams makes with Cheryl is limited by the outbursts of Satan, who refuses to be ignored. He delights in interfering with Dr. Adams and teasing him with hints as to whether or not he really is who he says he is.

As a first time director, Eriq LaSalle shows a talent for atmospherics. His pacing could use some work as the film drags a little in the middle but the teasing aspects of the dialogue and performances are compelling enough to hold your interest.

One thing that LaSalle would benefit from is better casting. Michael Beach is a wooden performer of little charisma. He sells the dramatic aspects of the film as his character reveals a mental illness of his own induced by his wife's death. However, the interaction between Beach and LaSalle and Beach and Ronny Cox is stilted and unbelievable as they act circles around Beach. Beach's poor interaction with LaSalle and Cox seem like they are chewing scenery but in reality they are simply eating a scene around Beach because somebody had to make the scenes interesting.

If anything, Crazy As Hell shows the potential of a great filmmaker in Eriq LaSalle and I look forward to his next turn behind the camera.

Movie Review: Alex & Emma

Alex & Emma (2003) 

Directed by Rob Reiner 

Written by Jeremy Leven 

Starring Luke Wilson, Kate Hudson, Sophie Marceau, David Paymer, Rob Reiner

Release Date June 20th, 2003 

Published June 20th, 2003 

Recently I had a conversation with a friend about director Rob Reiner and it reminded me of the number of great films he has made. A Few Good Men, The American President, This Is Spinal Tap and When Harry Met Sally amongst others combine great filmmaking with a pop sensibility that is entertaining and accessible without pandering.  However there have been occasions during Reiner's career when he lost that sense. In films such as North and The Story Of Us, Reiner mistakes quirky and cute for funny. For his latest picture, Alex & Emma, Reiner has the ingredients of When Harry Met Sally but the execution of The Story of Us.

Alex (Luke Wilson) is a New York writer with gambling debts that have Cuban gangsters hanging him out of a window. He has been promising for months that when his new novel was completed he would have their money. Unfortunately, he has hasn't written even a page. The gangsters give him one month to get the money or they will kill him.

Of course the only way Alex can get the money he owes, now doubled with interest for the extra time, he has to finish his novel. He can't type as fast as he thinks, so Alex comes up with the brilliant idea to hire a stenographer to type as he talks and transcribe the novel when it's complete. Enter Emma (Kate Hudson), a quirky, cute stenographer who believes she is going to work in a law office. Her meeting with Alex in his dingy apartment is one of the few bright funny scenes in the film as she mistakes him for a psycho killer.

After Alex explains what he needs from her, she's still not convinced. It's not until she reads the last page of his first novel that she agrees to work for him. That is one her quirks, Emma always reads the last page of a book to decide if the ending is worth reading toward. It's a cute quirk, but whether it's cute because it's cute or cute because it's Kate Hudson is debatable. If only the audience was given the same option because after seeing the end of Alex & Emma, I likely would not have sat through the whole thing. But I digress.

From this point on, we switch back and forth between Alex's novel about an American tutor hired to teach a pair of French kids while falling for their single mom (Sophie Marceau) and Alex and Emma as they begin to fall for each other. Naturally, elements of the real dynamic begin to seep into the novel. Alex creates a new character, a servant who he envisions as Emma without her knowing it. The character is a nice comic invention who begins as a bubbly blonde Swede then morphs into a severe red headed German and then a fiery Latina before finally settling on an American who looks just like Emma. It's a funny device but it plays as a device, a very noticeable one.

Being a romantic comedy puts Alex & Emma at an automatic disadvantage. We in the audience already expect the leads to end up together so the writers and director must come up with logical roadblocks in order to keep the characters apart til the end. The obstacles in Alex and Emma however, just don't work, especially the obvious curveball that comes near the end. It's yet another of those easily solvable situations that must remain unsolved to extend the film to its conclusion. Hudson's character is asked to do things that are illogical and defy what we have come to know of the character.

Reiner's sure-handed direction is there and he is blessed with the lovely Kate Hudson who saves most of her scenes on the sheer force of her talent and charisma. Co-star Luke Wilson however never seems comfortable and seems miscast as the roguish self-assured Alex. His offhanded laid back style never jives with the confident self-assured character he is supposed to portray and thus he came off flat.

What is really lacking in Alex & Emma however, is laughs. Hudson provides the biggest laughs, especially in her numerous incarnations in the novel, I especially loved her German accent. Very sexy. But overall, when you combine the lack of solid laughs and illogical romantic comedy roadblocks, you get an amiable attempt at romance but an unsuccessful attempt at that.

Movie Review: The Notebook

The Notebook (2004) 

Directed by Nick Cassavetes 

Written by Jeremy Leven 

Starring Ryan Gosling, Rachel McAdams, James Garner, Gena Rowlands, James Marsden, Joan Allen 

Release Date June 25th, 2004 

Published June 24th, 2004 

There is a terrific line in the movie High Fidelity where John Cusack sums up his short-term romance with Lily Taylor. "You have to be of a certain disposition to believe you’re going to be alone for the rest of your life at 26. We were of that disposition.” I too am of that disposition. At 28 years old I am single, really unattached single for the first time in a very long while. I have had steady relationships since I was 14 year old. Don't worry I'm going somewhere with this.

I get to thinking this way every time I see a romantic movie. What if I had my great love already and lost it? What if great love only exists in the movies? If that is true then The Notebook is a wonderful example of the big love I wish existed in real life. A collection of great actors comes together with a director slowly coming of age to create, not a perfect movie, but a romantic and memorable movie.

The film stars Ryan Gosling as Noah, a poor boy working in a lumber yard who one summer night meets the woman of his dreams. Her name is Allie (Rachel McAdams), the daughter of rich parents who has moved to the small southern town of Seabrook only for the summer. Allie does not share Noah's immediate attraction but eventually his charm breaks through and the two begin a torrid summer love affair.

Parallel to this is the story of an old couple living in a nursing home. James Garner and Gena Rowlands are the old couple. While he is in good shape, she is suffering from severe dementia. He kindly comforts her by reading to her from a notebook the story of Noah and Allie's love affair. You will have to see the film for the rest of their story.

Naturally, with Allie coming from a rich family and having a disapproving mother (Joan Allen), their affair is destined to be short lived. When Allie returns home very late from a date with Noah, her mother forces her to return to their home in Charlotte. She leaves a message for Noah to write to her but sadly, his letters are intercepted by her mother. He goes on to fight in World War II while she heads to college and a few years later is engaged to another man played by James Marsden. Noah and Allie reunite once more but again you will have to see the film to see if there’s is a happy ending.

Or you could read the book by Nicholas Sparks, the famed romance writer whose credits also include the sappy A Walk To Remember and the even sappier Message In A Bottle. Indeed Sparks has a tendency to lay it on pretty thick but The Notebook somehow is not as bogged down as the previous novels. Maybe it's better writers adapting the book to the screen but whatever the case, The Notebook is far better than either of Sparks’ other works.

Maybe it's just the amazing cast. Gena Rowlands and James Garner are fantastic. The heartbreaking chemistry of these two masterful actors should land them both Oscar nominations in the supporting categories. Rowlands especially is magnificent. I don't cry at movies very often, after years of working as a critic, but I was very moved by Ms. Rowlands’ work in this film. It helps that her son Nick Cassevetes' camera absolutely loves her.

Ryan Gosling has been a star on the rise for a few years now and with his performance here he has guaranteed his stardom. Gosling has the presence and chops of a true movie star. Watch the way he commands attention in every scene without having to force it. It's honestly like watching a young Paul Newman or maybe James Dean. Gosling has presence, gravitas, and charisma to go with his remarkable good looks. 

The films only obvious weak point is, unfortunately, Rachel McAdams who sadly can't find her footing for most of the film. It's probably her pairing with Gosling. Though they have okay chemistry, McAdams is clearly intimidated and Gosling is so good that his performance exposes her flaws. She may yet have stardom in her future, she was good in her comedic turn in Mean Girls earlier this year, this however is not her coming out party as a great actress.

The films real revelation may be director Nick Cassavetes who, after a series of almost great films, finally finds himself with The Notebook. The material is a little sappy at times, overly sentimental, even a little precious but Cassavetes is clearly in command and wrenches the film away from too much melodrama. Cassavetes smartly relies on his terrific actors to carry the day and they make this a memorable experience.

The Notebook is a wonderfully romantic film. It's a film that got to my emotions like few films are able to do. I always get a little broody and contemplative after a movie like this and it leads to hours of old photos and pop songs. I believe there is big love out there in real life, you just have to try and find it or let it find you. Even if you lose it, it's still big. No matter what, big love will always be on the big screen, a comforting reminder of a dream you have for yourself.