Movie Review Our Family Wedding

Our Family Wedding (2010) 

Directed by Rick Famuyiwa 

Written by Malcolm Spellman 

Starring Forest Whitaker, America Ferrara, Carlos Mencia, Regina King, Lance Gross 

Release Date March 12th, 2010 

Published March 14th, 2010 

Oscar winner Forest Whitaker is not known for his sense of humor. It's not that the actor best known as the embodiment of the evil dictator Idi Amin in Last King of Scotland cannot be funny but rather that he is better known for self serious drama and outright frightening evil. The comedy Our Family Wedding is an absolute out of the box move for Whitaker and a testament to his talent that he melts right into a comedic role despite how truly lame all around him is.

Our Family Wedding is a comedy of interracial manners starring Forrest Whitaker as the single dad to Lance Gross as Marcus a kid about to graduate from college and become a doctor. Marcus has a surprise for his dad though, he's getting married to Lucia who he has been living with for two years and plans on taking her with him on a Doctors without Borders mission in Southeast Asia for the next two years.

Whitaker's Brad is not the only one who will be shocked by these revelations, Lucia's Father Miguel (Carlos Mencia) is certain to be surprised by his daughter choosing to marry an African American, non-Catholic who wants to take her to Asia for two years. Oh, and Lucia is dropping out of law school to be with Marcus and her mother (Diana Maria Riva) knew about this but did not tell her husband.

The set up is not bad actually, it has a lot of built in conflict to build on. Unfortunately, director Rick Famuyiwa (Brown Sugar, The Wood) doesn't believe in his material and prefers relying on lame coincidence and goofball slapstick moments to pad the film out to feature length.

Because he couldn't think of anything less original or interesting, Famuyiwa has Whitaker and Mencia meet cute in a most convenient and unfunny fashion. The two push the racist stereotype button repeatedly until the joke becomes unfunny and by the time of the reveal that they are going to be family the joke is worn out.

Race issues are addressed only briefly and with no honest insight. The script by director Famuyiwa, Wayne Conley and Malcolm Spellman injects racial stereotypes as a punchline but fails on all accounts to take race seriously as an obstacle to Lucia and Marcus's romance.

The only really good part of Our Family Wedding is Forest Whitaker who slips comfortably into this comedic role and is the only actor who brings anything of depth to his character. Whitaker indulges the whims of his director, he does chase a goat in the movie (Ugh) but in the non goat chasing scenes he crafts a real character from the minor pieces given to him.

Our Family Wedding is dopey and second rate with a dearth of comedic interest. Forest Whitaker is solid but the film built around him is a rickety mess of lame stereotypes and dopey slapstick. Rick Famuyiwa is a much better director than this film demonstrates. Check out his smooth, smart romance Brown Sugar and skip Our Family Wedding.

Movie Review Resident Evil Apocalypse

Resident Evil Apocalypse (2004) 

Directed by Alexander Witt

Written by Paul W.S Andersn 

Starring Milla Jovovich, Sienna Guillory, Oded Fehr, Jared Harris, Mike Epps

Release Date September 10th, 2004

Published September 12th, 2004 

As bad as the first Resident Evil film was, written and directed by Paul W.S Anderson (ugh), could the sequel be any worse? Paul W.S Anderson stepping aside as director was a good first step, as is a script and story more faithful to its videogame source material. However first time director Alexander Witt, who's assistant director resume includes Speed 2, XXX and The Postman seems uninterested in improving on the original, unless you call being bigger, dumber and louder an improvement.

We begin where the last film left off. Our heroine Alice (Milla Jovovich) has just escaped from the Umbrella Corporation's evil underground lab The Hive, where she spent the previous night fighting the undead. Temporarily captured by Umbrella's evil scientists for a quick genetic upgrade, Alice finds herself in the chaotic remains of Racoon City, which has been overrun by zombies.

With most of the once peaceful town infected, and the evil Umbrella scientists having closed the only way out of town, Alice must team with the remaining survivors to fight the zombies and find a way out. With Alice are former cop Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory), armed forces specialist Carlos Olivera (Oded Fehr), former pimp L.J (Mike Epps) and a small band of cannon fodder who are picked off in rather predictable fashion.

As the survivors battle the zombies, the chance to escape comes from a former Umbrella scientist Dr. Ashford (Jared Harris). The good doctor will get them a helicopter if they will go to the town’s only school and retrieve his young daughter Angie (Sophie Vasseur). Standing in their way are an assortment of zombie children and a return of those feral organs-on-the-outside Dobermans from the first film.

Let's start with some good things like star Milla Jovovich who, though she has limited range as an actress, is amazingly hot and has a terrific physical presence. She's agile and good with a gun and a believable action heroine. In a better action movie she could be quite effective, but in the midst of this film’s mindlessness she's reduced to repeating herself into tedium.

The supporting cast of Sienna Guillory, Oded Fehr and Mike Epps don't have much time to make an impression in between all of the explosions, zombie bites and gunfire. Epps at least has a couple of humorous moments that he is well suited to deliver. The film could have used a little more of Epps' humor but that would require a far better script.

We cannot be surprised that a script this witless and banal was written by the master of witless banality, Paul W.S Anderson. Every line of dialogue, every moment of exposition is just killing time till the next explosion of big, dumb, loud violence. This can work if you have the slightest bit of wit or sense of irony but Anderson has none. Director Alexander Witt doesn't have any either. His visuals consist of properly framing for the explosion and.... well, that's it.

This plot is at the very least more closely related to the popular video game, a fact that might appeal to fans of the game but is of little comfort to non-fans. Compared to the first film, this Resident Evil manages to be bigger, dumber and louder than the original and that is certainly not an improvement. On the bright side it's still a better video game based movie than Tomb Raider.

Movie Review On the Basis of Sex

On the Basis of Sex (2018) 

Directed by Mimi Leder

Written by Daniel Stiepleman

Starring Felicity Jones, Armie Hammer, Justin Theroux, Sam Waterston, Kathy Bates 

Release Date December 25, 2018

Published December 21st, 2018 

On the Basis of Sex stars Felicity Jones in the life story of sitting Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. We join the life of Ruth Bader Ginsburg as she became one of the first classes at Harvard to allow women, all the way back in 1954. Mrs Ginsburg was already married to her beloved husband, Martin (Armie Hammer) and was eager to start a family all while navigating the sexist and incredibly demanding schedule of a Harvard Law student.

As if her life weren’t difficult enough, in short order, Ruth becomes a mother and her husband develops testicular cancer and cannot attend his own Harvard law classes. So, Ruth attends and takes notes in Martin’s classes, attends her own, writes papers for herself while taking dictation from Martin for his coursework and while the two are raising their baby daughter. To say this woman was driven and brilliant is quite the understatement.

When Martin graduates and accepts a position at a high powered New York City law firm, Ruth completes her Harvard coursework while also attending classes at Columbia to be close to her husband. She then struggles to find a law firm that will hire her despite graduating at the top of her class. Ruth ends up accepting a teaching position at Rutgers where she finds herself at the center of a cultural revolution as her students are taking to the streets to demand social change.

Inspired in part by her students and by her daughter, Jane (Cailee Spaeny), Ruth finds a lawsuit that challenges the status quo in a way that will reverberate through the years in the battle against sexism. A Colorado man was denied a caregivers tax break because only women were allowed to be caretakers to family members who were incapacitated by illness. If Ruth can prove that the tax law is discriminatory against a man, it could create a precedent that could knock down dozens of laws that give different rights to men than to women.

On the Basis of Sex was directed by Mimi Leder, a solid pro director who brings a strong polish to this otherwise very straightforward biopic. There is certainly a remarkable amount of hero worship going on but it’s not entirely unearned. As played by Felicity Jones, Ruth Bader Ginsburg is some kind of real-life superhero, a rebuke to anyone who says you can’t have it all. Top of her class, married, two kids, and one of the most notable legal careers of modern American history. Indeed, that is heroic.

If I have any issues with On the Basis of Sex, it’s with the compressed timeline of the film. At times, because of the editing and the odd transitions, it can be difficult to track where we are in time. The film employs time jumps to get to the juicier parts of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s life but in that, we have a moment where she goes from having one child to suddenly having a toddler son in such an abrupt fashion that you might miss a scene just catching up to where we are in time.

On the Basis of Sex is just a tad sloppy here in there from a structural standpoint but that’s a relatively minor issue. It’s one of those things that separates a good movie from a great movie. On the Basis of Sex is quite a good movie in my estimation but it’s not great. Leder’s approach to the life of Ginsburg is just a little too antiseptic. I am not asking for there to be dirt or grit, but some will find the level of hero worship approaching hagiography.

On the Basis of Sex is the second movie of 2018 dedicated to the life of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The other is a more necessary and comprehensive documentary called RBG. That film does render On the Basis of Sex a tad redundant. While On the Basis of Sex is kept to a specific portion of Ginsburg’s life and that gives it at least a different focus, RBG’s comprehensiveness makes it the far more essential portrait.

On the Basis of Sex is a sturdy and involving drama, a little loose in the editing but certainly not a bad movie. The lead performance from Felicity Jones is energetic, intelligent and engaging and the supporting cast is solid, with Armie Hammer as the standout as Martin Ginsburg, an unsung hero who supported his wife every step of her journey, even as every other man in her life created new barriers to her success.

If you had to choose one movie on the life of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, RBG is far more essential but On the Basis of Sex is strong enough that I can recommend it.

Movie Review Official Secrets

Official Secrets (2019)

Directed by Gavin Hood

Written by Gavin Hood 

Starring Keira Knightley, Matt Smith, Matthew Goode, Rhys Ifans

Release Date October 18th, 2019

Published October 18th, 2019 

Official Secrets is the kind of sturdy, unassailable drama that director Gavin Hood is good at making. Dispassionate and a little dull, longing for colorful characters to liven up the presentation, but filled with factual interpretation that is true to the subject and dramatized well enough to hold your attention and earn most of the feelings intended by the story being told. Call it the church of being just good enough. 

Official Secrets, a title I struggle to remember even as it is a title that fits well in the context of the story, stars Keira Knightley in the true story of Katherine Gunn,  a worker bee at a British intelligence agency in the midst of the most recent Iraq conflict. The American government is pushing hard for war and Tony Blair has become George W Bush’s go-to ally for getting the pro-war message out. Everyday, the case for war is growing and it will take a revolutionary act of defiance to slow it down. 

That was the act of Katherine Gunn, an act of revolutionary defiance. Gunn stole a memo from her work interpreting and transcribing intelligence drama for the GSA. In the memo was proof that the Americans were spying on members of allied countries in hopes of pressuring those countries to vote in favor of going to war against Saddam Hussein. Releasing this explosive memo to the public would be an embarrassment to British leadership and turn the British public further against the war. 

With the help of a war protesting friend, the memo goes from Katherine, through to a reporter at the Observer newspaper, Martin Bright who, with the help of his editor, Peter Beaumont (Matthew Goode) and a fellow reporter working in America, Ed Vulliamy (Rhys Ifans), manages to confirm the information and print it in the newspaper. You assume from here that this is an inspiring story of a whistleblower but Official Secrets doesn’t seek to inspire as much as it strives to tell what really happened. 

The reality was that it took weeks before the memo was published and enough time passed that Katherine began to think it would never be printed and she was okay with that. Rather than being single mindedly obsessed with getting the truth out, Katherine is frightened and resigned to the fate of the world going to war even as she knows it should not be happening. When the memo is published, Katherine becomes exposed and rather than being inspired to the fight, she is dragged into defending herself before finally buying into her own cause. 

That’s pretty much as it happened in reality as well. Katherine Gunn became a revolutionary almost by accident. She wanted to stop the war but she was plagued by doubts and was even willing to forget about the whole thing and go on with her life while the war that she knew was illegal and unjust raged on. Katherine is a hero but a complex one and Keira Knightley does well to play that conflict and allow that to drive the narrative nearly as much as exposing the war as a fraud. 

Of course, this movie doesn’t do us much good now. Movies like Official Secrets feel obsolete in the wake of all that has happened, including the Iraq War, Afghanistan and the conflicts we appear to be readying for around the globe today courtesy of a President seemingly spoiling for a fight. It’s great to have a historic document like Official Secrets but the film doesn’t escape from the futility of the history that inspired it. 

You have a duty to stand against tyranny is a good message but not one that Official Secrets makes all that memorably or forcefully. 

Documentary Review Oceans

Oceans (2010) 

Directed by Jaques Perrin

Written by Documentary

Starring Oceans, Pierce Brosnan

Release Date April 21st, 2010 

Published April 21st, 2010 

Some of the most astonishing sights ever brought to the big screen have nothing to do with CGI, 3D or Megan Fox. These magnificent sights were captured by the patient, dedicated artists at Disney Nature who in their latest Earth Day documentary “Oceans” may make the folks at the Discovery Channel jealous.

French director Jaques Perrin helmed this awesome project that filmed in over 50 different places around the globe from the tip of South Africa to the farthest depths of the arctic to the beaches that inspired Charles Darwin and the warm waters of the Caribbean. Perrin and his crews spent more than 4 years filming with groundbreaking underwater cameras and capturing sights never before seen.

Pierce Brosnan is the voice of “Oceans” and his relaxed brogue holds together this relatively short episodic feature that doesn't so much tell a story as it strings together a series of astonishing images that holds the audience enthralled by all the beauty and wonder on display.

One will naturally assume that, despite the title, “Oceans” is a rather dry (get it?), scientific, educational and environmentally activist feature. That however, is a grand overstatement. The reality is that the images captured in “Oceans” are so strikingly, breathtakingly beautiful that the whole is as easily entertaining and engaging as it is activist or educational.

Yes, time is spent on just how much damage we have done to our oceans. Most impacting is the sight from beneath a trail of garbage floating in an oddly direct line from a river directly into the Atlantic. The filmmakers smartly avoid too much shock imagery as they take us inside fishing nets off the coast of Alaska where we see from below a cloud of blood flowing from a rising net as fishermen go in for the kill.

It’s not as impactful as the Oscar winning shock images from “The Cove” but images like the garbage and the blood are merely asides in “Oceans.”

Jaques Perrin and his crew keeps the focus of “Oceans” on the astonishing glories of the beneath the seas and in doing so keeps the audience in raw wonder as we attempt to discern just how certain images could possibly have been captured, especially the speed racer like Dolphins who cover acres of ocean at unbelievable speeds. The dolphins are filmed from above with a low flying helicopter and from below in ways that are never explained but will leave you breathless.

Disney's return to the world of nature documentaries, a field they left behind years ago after being pioneers of early nature films, is a glorious success. 2009's “Earth” was a strong effort but “Oceans” is the equivalent of Toy Story, the first Pixar feature to demonstrate the awesome, artistic possibilities of CG Animation. “Oceans” expands the limits of what we might expect from Disney Nature.

”Oceans' ' is a glorious, eye popping experience and it doesn't even need 3D. I cannot wait until next year when DisneyNature takes us into the world of Jungle Cats.

Movie Review Nowhere Boy

Nowhere Boy (2009) 

Directed by Sam Taylor Wood

Written by Matt Greenhalgh

Starring Aaron Johnson, Kristen Scott Thomas,Thomas Brodie-Sangster, David Morrisey

Release Date December 26th, 2009 

Published April 15th, 2010 

Few actors have had as good a year as quietly as 21 year old Aaron Johnson. First he blasted off into stardom with his role as nerdy kid turned superhero in the wonderfully subversive “Kick Ass.” Then, in late 2010, Johnson turned his nerd image from “Kick Ass” on its ear with a brilliant turn as a teenaged John Lennon in “Nowhere Boy,” now on DVD.

“Nowhere Boy,” directed by newcomer Sam Taylor Wood, takes us through the teen years of the iconic Beatles co-founder John Lennon. The story begins in sadness as, after a brief introduction, young John Lennon loses his beloved Uncle George to a heart attack.

It was George who had fostered John’s creativity and interest in music under the disapproving gaze of John’s Aunt Mimi (Kristen Scott Thomas) With George gone the unmoored John falls in with his older Cousin, Stan (James Johnson) who leads John to the discovery of his mother Julia (Ann Marie Duff) who had surrendered him to his Aunt following the disappearance of his father a merchant seaman.

While visiting his mother, without telling his Aunt, John discovered Rock n’ Roll, Fats Domino and Elvis Presley. Julia bought John his first guitar and watched him learn to play in her living room. As John’s grades slip at school Mimi becomes suspicious and a family showdown is inevitable. Director Sam Taylor Wood takes a good deal of creative license to bring a little extra drama to the real life events of John Lennon’s formative years but there is nothing so dramatic or untrue that it will leave fans crying foul.

The key to “Nowhere Boy” is not in the dramatized narrative of John Lennon’s teen years anyway. Rather, the key is the lively and fresh faced performance of Aaron Johnson who captures both the cocksure, comic musician side of Lennon and the vulnerable boy at his heart. Lennon was forever affected by the strange role that his mother played in his life and that comes out throughout his musical career.

“Nowhere Boy” gets its juice not only from lending a Freudian context to Lennon’s later work but by dramatizing the history of The Beatles like never before. Sam Taylor Wood gives us as close an approximation as we are likely to get of the events that created the greatest rock band of all time.

Through the performances of Aaron Johnson as Lennon, Thomas Brodie Sangster as a pubescent Paul McCartney and Sam Bell as George Harrison we get a glimpse at music history never before seen. Nowhere Boy succeeds in revealing John Lennon and the ways his childhood influenced the rest of his life and when you hear songs like “Mother” you will flash back to this film and be awash in new and more poignant meanings.

The same could be said of several other Lennon solo records as well as Beatles classics should one want to parse their psychology but my point is merely that Nowhere Boy works as both a companion piece to the legendary John Lennon canon and as a stand alone drama of one young man’s journey toward unlikely success. In Aaron Johnson’s ultra-cool performance we get the John Lennon we imagined as a young man, cocky, funny and ungodly talented with just a hint of a haunted soul.

Movie Review Nothing Like the Holidays

Nothing Like the Holidays (2008) 

Directed by Alfredo De Villa 

Written by Allison Swan, 2 other screenwriters

Starring Luis Guzman, John Leguizamo, Debra Messing, Alfred Molina 

Release Date December 12th, 2008

Published December 11th, 2008 

I have nothing really interesting to observe about Nothing Like The Holidays. I watched it with my friend and fellow critic Linda Cook and after it was over, instead of talking about it, we immediately started talking about Frost/Nixon, Doubt, Rachel Getting Married and other such movies that still have not come to our neck of the woods.

There is nothing horribly wrong with Nothing Like The Holidays. It's just that, I watched it and when it was over it fell almost completely out of my consciousness. Now, as I sit down to write about it, it's a struggle to remember salient plot details for a description. IMDB reminds me of the actors and the roles they played but I cannot remember who was who and why without checking the reviews from other critics. What more is there to say?

Nothing Like The Holidays is a Christmas movie about a Puerto Rican family in the Humboldt Park neighborhood in Chicago. I could write lovely little things about this melting pot of a neighborhood but that would involve little about the movie I am supposed to be writing about.

I could dwell on the racial aspects of Nothing Like The Holidays but I think equality calls on me to treat this movie as I would any other holiday movie and not single out the Latino aspect as something special, though historically, sadly, it is notable.

It is notable, though the film's content, characters, and humor is far from notable. Mostly because I have forgotten about it. If this review seems overly hateful, it's not intentional. Nothing Like The Holidays isn't a disaster. It's just wildly mediocre and entirely forgettable.