Movie Review Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down the White House

Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down the White House (2017) 

Directed by Peter Landesman

Written by Peter Landesman

Starring Liam Neeson, Diane Lane, Marton Csokas, Ike Barinholz, Tony Goldwyn 

Release Date September 29th, 2017 

It baffles me that any filmmaker could screw up making a movie about Mark Felt. How is it possible to fumble a subject so timely, important, historic, and filled with all of the great cinematic trappings. I’m left baffled by the movie Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down the White House. This Liam Neeson-starring drama should have been a slam dunk. This a subject that should be front and center in the day and age of a President who faces pressures that only Richard Nixon could truly relate to.

Mark Felt (Liam Neeson) is an FBI lifer, J. Edgar Hoover’s right hand. Felt is credited by some as being the man who restrained some of Hoover’s worst instincts in the director’s later years, or at least the film would have you believe that. When we meet Mark Felt in the titular movie about him, he is facing down Richard Nixon’s West Wing staff who’ve heard rumors that Hoover is ready to step aside. The implication of the conversation is that if Felt can show he will play ball with the White House, he will be the next FBI Director. When Felt demonstrates his loyalty to Hoover over Nixon, the die is cast.

When Hoover passes away, Felt and his team are thrown into a political maelstrom. L. Patrick Gray (Martin Csokas) is named interim director and being that he was just Nixon’s man in the Justice Department prior to this posting, Felt is aware of where Gray’s loyalties lie and what that means for the independence of the FBI. When Watergate hits, things only grow more harrowing and Felt, a man dedicated to keeping secrets, suddenly finds himself in the position of having to reveal them.

Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down the White House has a story that is all teed up for the filmmakers. The story is rife with political intrigue and spy play on top of having a historic significance that could not ring more familiar and timelier. Unfortunately, writer-director Peter Landesman is just too clumsy to bring it together. Landesman’s writing and direction are all over the place, especially the script which is a shamble of expository dialogue and sloppy scene-setting.

Find my full length review in the Geeks Community on Vocal

Movie Review Plane

Plane (2023) 

Directed by Jean Francois Richet 

Written by Charles Cumming, J.P Davis 

Starring Gerard Butler, Mike Colter, Tony Goldwyn 

Release Date January 13th, 2023 

Published January 13th, 2023

Plane stars Gerard Butler as Brodie Torrance, a commercial pilot on a fateful plane flight. Brodie is piloting a flight from Malaysia to Tokyo with plans for himself to go on from there to Hawaii to meet his daughter. Of course, this is a movie, we know that meeting will not happen as planned. Nope, Brodie Torrance is in for a rough flight, one that begins with bad weather, his plane being struck by lightning, a narrowly avoided crash, and a kidnapping of his relatively small number of passengers plus crew members. 

After surviving his plane having lost its electronics and much of its fuel, Brodie Torrance has to navigate a jungle on an unknown island where criminals and mercenaries have taken up residence and use any foreign visitors as currency on a worldwide kidnapping market. Somehow, with no radio or cell service, Brodie must rescue his passengers and get them safely off of the island. He's joined by a former soldier and current arrestee for murder, Louis Gaspare (Mike Colter), who was being extradited for his alleged crime until the plane went down. Now, he's Brodie's only ally. 

Meanwhile, at the headquarters of the generically named airline, the CEO has called in a fixer. Tony Goldwyn lights up the movie Plane with a charismatic if rather rote performance as Scarsdale, a man who can make things happen for the right price. Scarsdale is the boss of a group of mercenaries for hire who work outside the law to fix P.R problems for major corporations around the globe. That might sound unethical but these guys are the true heroes of Plane as they swoop in to perform the rescue that Brodie and Louis get started. 

As for the baddies, they are a group of nameless, generic, terrorists, vaguely racist caricatures, living in squalor and using human beings as currency. They exist to shoot guns at the good guys and die unmourned deaths. That they perform this task well or not is not important, they are fodder for a Hollywood action movie and could just as easily be replaced by CGI aliens or robots and have the exact same impact on the story. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media linked here. 

Movie Review Last House on the Left

The Last House on the Left (2009) 

Directed by Dennis Illadis 

Written by Carl Ellsworth

Starring Monica Potter, Tony Goldwyn, Sara Paxton, Garret Dillahunt 

Release Date March 13th, 2009 

Published March 12th, 2009

I am curious just what the makers of the new Last House on the Left felt as they watched the final product of all of their hard work. What exactly did they see when they screened it? What did they feel they had accomplished with this movie? And most baffling of all for me, what did they think would make anyone want to see this?

Honestly, how can they have filmed scenes like those contained in Last House on the Left and thought boy I can't wait to put this out into the world. What is the intended effect? Shock? To induce vomiting? To merely disgust and appaul? Can those really be a goal? What kind of audience would seek out such an experience?

Last House on the Left is a nasty bit of business that, I'll grant you, is not nearly as nihilistic and vile as Eli Roth's Hostel movies or anything directed by the perverted mind of Rob Zombie, but it is certainly a distant relative.

Last House on the Left is a 'reimagining' of Wes Craven's bizarre 1972 Last House on the Left, one of the progenitors of the modern debased and debauched horror genre. That film however, for all of its incredible depravity is a cultural artifact, coming as it did as a sign post on the road to the end of the peace and love generation. In that it had some merit.

The new Last House on the Left has no such cultural cache and instead plays like it's killing movie cousins, as a mere demonstration of death and the many disturbing variations that horror filmmakers can invent on the subject of death. The more grisly and authentic the better for these twisted souls.

The movie ostensibly stars Sara Paxton as Mari Collingwood, a 17 year old on vacation with her parents Emma (Monica Potter) and Dr. John Collingwood (Tony Goldwyn) at a lovely lakeside cabin. Mari decides to head into a nearby town to visit an old friend, Paige (Martha MacIsaac, Superbad) and tells mom she may be spending the night.

Once in town, the girls meet up with Justin (Spencer Treat Clark) , a quiet young kid who promises good weed. They follow him back to his hotel. Unfortunately, they are soon joined by Justin's dad Krug (Garret Dillahunt). Krug is an escaped con and a disturbed sadistic soul. He and his cronies Sadie (Riki Lindholme) and Francis (Aaron Paul) decide to take the girls hostage.

They take Mari's car and a trip into the woods. There Paige is murdered for trying to escape and Mari is brutally raped and left for dead floating in the lake. With a storm brewing and no car, the four make their way to the closest house, what they don't know is that the closest house is the very lake house owned by Mari's parents. Oh and Mari's not dead.

This horrid set up turns into what I am sure is supposed to be a cathartic revenge fantasy with mom and dad going biblical on the baddies who hurt their daughter. Instead, Last House on the Left plays as a meditation on ugly stupid violence and the demonstration of death.

So while I am sure director Dennis Illiadis means for us to take pleasure in seeing the bad guys punished his mode and method of eliminating the bad guys is so convoluted and overblown that one can only witness and never really feel that visceral sense of repulsive, lower brain excitement that comes with righteous vengeance.

Worse though is the films centerpiece the murder and subsequent rape and near murder of Paige and Mari. Does anyone really need to see someone raped on screen to understand the horrific nature of the crime? More to the point, what is the audience supposed to take away from the brutal screen reenactment of such a crime? Are we meant to vomit, to wretch. Why is that necessary?

Rape is merely a plot point in Last House on the Left and not something to consider with thought and care. It's used as a way of demonstrating the evil of these characters and why we are later in the film supposed to delight in their elaborate demise. It's a crass manipulation and one not worthy of the film spent capturing it.

Last House on the Left is a shameful exercise in degradation as titillation. We are meant to be cheered by this movie because of the revenge plot but it's all so clumsy and dull witted that it shines an even brighter spotlight on how disturbed the filmmakers were when they so artfully captured Mari's horrific attack. That part they took great pains to capture. The rest they slapped together with spit and tape.

If that doesn't demonstrate the frightening place Last House on the Left occupies in the modern horror movie canon nothing I say can.

Movie Review The Last Kiss

The Last Kiss (2006) 

Directed by Tony Goldwyn 

Written by Paul Haggis 

Starring Zach Braff, Jacinda Barrett, Casey Affleck, Rachel Bilson, Harold Ramis, Blythe Danner 

Release Date September 15th, 2006 

Published September 14th, 2006 

Having turned 30 years old this year I had not really thought about it as a milestone. When I was a kid 30 was old but now that I'm there I don't feel old. In fact I don't feel that much different than the little kid who thought 30 was old. Other than living on my own and having to clean up after myself; I still have some of my childhood hobbies, X-Box, baseball cards and such. The characters in Tony Goldberg's latest directorial effort The Last Kiss are just about to turn 30 and they are terrified. Facing things such as marriage, kids and mortgages, the characters in The Last Kiss face the kind of crises that most men save for their 50th birthday not the 30th.

Zach Braff leads a terrific ensemble in The Last Kiss as Michael; an architect who has just found out his girlfriend Jenna (Jascinda Barrett) is going to have a baby. The panic written on his face is masked by his good humor but is still quite apparent to his pals, Izzy (Michael Weston), Chris (Casey Affleck), and Kenny (Eric Christian Olson).

Michael's friends, like Michael are just about to turn 30 and are also facing grown up issues. Izzy just lost the girl he has loved since high school and is planning an escape to Mexico. Kenny is thinking of going with Izzy on the road trip, a desire that arises after a woman he met and had one night stand with tries introduce him to her parents. And then there is Chris; the only married man in the group. Chris and his wife Danielle (Lauren Lee Smith) have been struggling since having their baby boy and Chris thinks he wants out.

For Michael the troubling grown up thought has coalesced around one thing. If he commits to being with Jenna for the rest of his life she will be the last woman he will ever kiss, a haunting prospect for a 29 year old who feels his best years are still ahead of him. When a college girl, Kim (Rachel Bilson), approaches him at a wedding he see's her beauty but it is her youth that reminds him of his past. He still feels college was the best time of his life. When Michael chances a tryst with Kim it's out of fear of the future as much or more than simply lust.

Directed by Tony Goldwyn from a script by Oscar winner Paul Haggis, The Last Kiss is smart in the ways it draws out these characters and their conflicts. The problems come from the fact that these characters, are childish, selfish and petulant, not exactly the kind of people you go to the movies to meet. Now, there is something to be said for how truthful these characters, true to themselves and their established natures, that still does not make them enjoyable.

Then there is the ending that employs a gimmick in order to resolve the conflict between two central characters. Because neither Goldwyn or Haggis could think of a smarter more mature way to resolve the picture we are left with a character resorting to extreme stubbornness to bring the movie to its conclusion. It's not an egregious issue, nothing that would keep me from recommending this otherwise likable film but it does keep the film from rising from a good movie to a really good movie.

Zach Braff is is quickly becoming a welcome presence on the big screen. His debut in Garden State was a revelation as Braff shows chops as an actor and director. As an actor for hire in The Last Kiss, Braff is rumored to have punched up his dialogue a bit at the behest of director Tony Goldwyn. Whether it was Braff or writer Paul Haggis, the writing of Michael is the smartest thing in the film. It's a difficult role because Michael rarely does what we in the audience want him to do. He more than risks being likable but because he is played by Zach Braff we forgive easier than we might with another actor.

Jascinda Barrett is a rising star who I first noticed in the little seen drama The Human Stain. Since then she was a small but winning presence in Bridget Jones 2 and she managed to survive the abysmal remake Poseidon. It's not just her lovely spokesmodel features, Barrett has a real talent for finding the depths of her characters. In The Last Kiss she wonderfully plays Jenna's contentment early on and her stunned sadness later as he entire world crashes around her.

Barrett's Jenna is central to Michael's plot but she is also deeply inolved in the films best subplot. Veterans Blythe Danner and Tom Wilkinson play Jenna's parents. Wilkinson's therapist believes everything is fine as does his daughter but Danner shows that everything is not okay when she decides to reveal an affair she had three years prior to the films timeline and decides to leave her husband. Danner has a fabulous moment where she meets up with the man she cheated with and is sad to find he is now happily married.

Watching Barrett play off Wilkinson and Danner is lovely and grounds the film in maturity when it desperately needs it. Without this subplot the film would be nothing but childish posturing and male pattern whining.

Arrested development is a popular theme in 2006. Characters in movies as varied as the stoner comedy Grandma's Boy, the romantic comedy Failure To Launch, Owen Wilson's Dupree in You Me and Dupree and Vince Vaughn in The Break Up, are all examples of men with severe fears of commitment and growing up. It is as if adulthood has replaced Freddy Krueger as the boogeyman of modern times.

The Last Kiss is the most mature of the group of films which make what used to be called Peter Pan syndrome their subject. These characters are no more willing to grow up but are more thoughtful about the subject than the examples I cited before. By that measure; The Last Kiss is a worthy effort. It helps to have such a naturally funny cast to pull it off.

Movie Review: The Mechanic

The Mechanic (2011) 

Directed by Simon West

Written by Lewis John Carlino, Richard Wenk

Starring Jason Statham, Ben Foster, Donald Sutherland, Tony Goldwyn 

Release Date January 28th, 2011 

Published January 27th, 2011 

If by some chance you have managed to avoid every other movie about coolly efficient assassins who live alone like monks and share a warrior's code with old school samurais then you might find the new Jason Statham film “The Mechanic” interesting. If, however, you are like me and you have seen any hit man movie ever you will find nothing the least bit original or fascinating about this rehash of sub-genre cliché.

Jason Statham is Arthur Bishop a classical music fan who also happens to be the coldest of the cold blooded killers in the world. Arthur's specialty is hits that don't look like hits and in the opening montage we watch as Arthur murders the head of a South American cartel by making the death look like an accidental drowning. The murder is clever but more in a B-movie fashion than in the sleek, cool fashion the film seems to think it's pulling off.

Arthur's next hit will not be as efficient; he's been hired to kill his mentor. Harry McKenna (Donald Sutherland) taught Arthur all that he knows about killing people. But now that Harry is aging and in a wheelchair he has become a greedy liability to the higher ups who give the contract to Arthur out of a sense of decency and respect, or something. The expectation is that Arthur will make the old timer's death quick and painless.

Arthur has a son, Steve (Ben Foster), and though the two were not close Steve wants revenge for his father's death. Lucky for Arthur, the unpredictable, hot headed Steve doesn't know who killed his dad. Out of guilt or sympathy, Arthur takes Steve under his wing and begins teaching him the tools of the trade for a 'Mechanic,' aka assassin, a man who fixes problems.

Simon West directed “The Mechanic,” taking the bones of a forgotten Charles Bronson flick from the early 70's and taking out anything vaguely arty like the original's wordless 15 minute opening in which Bronson lays out a complicated kill and cover up without feeling the need to narrate the proceedings the way Statham's Arthur does temporarily and fitfully throughout the new film.

The original “The Mechanic” was no art-house film but it had more ambition than this knock off and in Bronson a more compellingly stoic and fascinating lead. Jason Statham's one note performance, compounded by the dull and needless voiceover, has the same lack of energy and innovation as Simon West's direction. It's a shame because Statham is capable of being a charismatic presence but The Mechanic sucks the life out of the bullet headed action hero. 

Ben Foster is the truly unfortunate one in “The Mechanic.” This talented young actor who has brought vitality and unpredictability to roles in other not so great movies like “Pandorum” as well as great movies like “3:10 to Yuma” and the military drama “The Messenger,” where he helped Woody Harrelson to an Oscar nomination, is stranded in the one note role in The Mechanic. Much like Statham, Foster is hamstrung by an uninspired script and Simon West's dull direction. 

Dreary, derivative, and deeply uninspired, The Mechanic is a complete failure. It's indicative of every other movie Simon West has directed, a dull, often insulting rehash of genre cliches, slickly produced with little care for character or storytelling. 

Movie Review The Last Samurai

The Last Samurai (2003) 

Directed by Ed Zwick 

Written by John Logan, Ed Zwick, Marshall Herskowitz 

Starring Tom Cruise, Timothy Spall, Ken Watanabe, Billy Connelly, Tony Goldwyn 

Release Date December 5th, 2003 

Published December 4th, 2003 

In his nearly 20-year career as a director, Ed Zwick has yet to show the auteur's spark that separates great directors from good directors. Like a modern Michael Curtiz, Zwick shows flairs of brilliance here and there and, like Curtiz, he makes wonderful, studio-driven pictures, but has yet to find a style of his own. Curtiz made one masterpiece: Casablanca. Zwick has yet to make his masterpiece though, his latest picture, The Last Samurai, approaches greatness, it's conventional, unmemorable style keeps it from being called a masterpiece.

The Last Samurai stars Tom Cruise as a former civil war hero named Nathan Ahlgren who has spent his time since the end of the war inside a whiskey bottle. Working for a company demonstrating firearms for pennies, Ahlgen is trying to forget the horrors of the war by drinking himself to death. Things change when his former army friend Zeb Gant (Billy Connolly) offers him an opportunity to make a lot of money doing what he does best: making war.

The job is to go to Japan and help train the Japanese army in modern warfare. The Japanese are only beginning to use guns and artillery in battle and the emperor of Japan has ordered his closest advisor, Mr. Omura (Japanese director Masato Harada), to bring in the Americans to train the peasant army. The emperor’s advisor is in a precarious situation and must ready the army for war against a rising tide of Samurai warriors who oppose the rapid modernization of their homeland.

The samurai are being displaced as the protectors of Japan by the modern army but, more importantly, their code of conduct--the Bushido--is being pushed aside by the rapid modernization that has brought an influx of foreigners to Japan looking to take advantage of a new market. The samurai don't wish to stand in the way of progress but merely to slow it to a point where history will not be forgotten or, rather, completely erased by so-called progress.

The samurai are lead by the charismatic Katsumoto (Ken Watanabe), the last living head of a samurai clan. Once an advisor to the empower, he was cast aside for opposing the encroachment of foreigners. On the battlefield, his prowess as a tactician and warrior has helped his samurai army overcome an army with swords defeating guns.

When Ahlgren, under the command of his former Civil war Colonel Bagley (Tony Goldwyn), is forced to lead an unprepared Japanese army against Katsumoto's samurai, Ahlgren is nearly killed as his platoon of soldiers are slaughtered by the samurai. Katsumoto spares Ahlgren's life after watching him hold off several samurai with merely a broken flagpole. Ahlgren is taken as a prisoner back to the samurais’ mountain enclave. There, his wounds are tended by Katsumoto's sister, Taka (Koyuki). There is a great deal of tension in their relationship for reasons that are best left unsaid.

Ahlgren is held captive throughout the winter and he and Katsumoto develop an uneasy friendship through their quiet conversations about war. Katsumoto reads Ahlgren's journals detailing the Civil War as well as the American army's eradication of the American Indian, something Ahlgren feels gravely guilty about. Gradually, Ahlgren assimilates into the samurai culture and soon he will be forced to choose sides in an inevitable war between the past and the future of Japan.

For Cruise, The Last Samurai marks yet another stellar performance that will likely be overshadowed by his stature as a sex symbol. It doesn't seem to matter how well Cruise performs in any film, his looks and image always get the attention. It's a terrible shame because Cruise is, in my opinion, turning out some of the finest work of any actor working today. His role in The Last Samurai is deserving of a Best Actor nomination and, in a weak field, he is likely to get it. He deserves to win but he deserved to win a couple of times and did not, so I won't get my hopes up.

Watanabe may actually outshine Cruise on Oscar night. His portrayal of Katsumoto is a complicated and brilliant performance that captures the essence of what Zwick wants us to understand of the samurai. Watanabe personifies the samurai warrior code, and communicates its importance to the audience with his subtle intelligence and spirit. If he doesn't win Best Supporting Actor, I will be very disappointed.

For Zwick, The Last Samurai is another signpost on the way to a potential masterpiece. It's an epic work of directorial craftsmanship. What Zwick lacks is a signature style that tells you this is an Ed Zwick film. The Last Samurai is a slave to conventional three-act filmmaking and conventional shooting styles. It is, without a doubt, a terrific work, but it comes up short of being a masterpiece because it's too slick and stylish. The film is too easily fit into a Hollywood marketing campaign to be a significant work of art.

The Last Samurai must settle for being a terrific work of pop entertainment, a conventional Hollywood work of crafty brilliance that showcases a star at the height of his abilities and a director with the potential for greatness.