Joker - Movie Review

Starring Joaquin Phoenix, Robert DeNiro, Zazie Beetz, Frances Conroy, Brett Cullen, Glenn Fleschler, Bill Camp, Shea Whigham and Marc Maron.

Written by Todd Phillips & Scott Silver.

Directed by Todd Phillips.

★★★½ 

This is unlike any DC “comic book movie” that’s come before. This has taken the skin of the Joker and placed over the aesthetic of a late 1970’s-early 1980’s Martin Scorsese movie. It owes a lot to The King of Comedy, but its main inspiration would be Taxi Driver. It’s fitting that DeNiro shows up here.

The film centers on Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix), an obviously disturbed man with mental illness, on seven medications, but facing a cruel 1981 Gotham where the gap between rich and poor has never been more stark. This isn’t an origin story so much as a journey, and the series of unfortunate events that befall him feel like a hindsight explanation of how we’re going to end where we know we’re going to end.

1981 Gotham feels just like the New York we see in Taxi Driver, the New York you could believe would turn into a prison-state when Kurt Russell went to go help someone escape from it, or would have Popeye Doyle beat up suspects.

The cinematography is top-notch, the score is spot-on, and the screenplay takes us down this dark, bleak hole, where we watch a man decide that the only way the world makes sense is if he stops caring about right and wrong.

I can’t praise Joaquin Phoenix’s performance enough. He embodies every inch of the character. He commands the screen the entire time and there’s not one wasted gesture or glance. I would argue in the third act, he becomes the scariest on-screen Joker we’ve ever had.

I can see why this is getting mixed reviews, but some of it is unfair. The “buzz” around it inspiring copycat killers was ridiculous. The political statements it makes are ones that you’d think “woke” critics would agree with. Also, it’s a feel-bad movie. It’s one you respect or admire but it’s not “fun.” Which is why it reminds me of Taxi Driver. It’s unilaterally considered a classic, but it’s not one anyone wants to watch over and over again.

Side note: My wife pointed out some problems with some revelations from Arthur’s childhood, but I can chalk those up to “Gotham in 1950 was really messed up.”

Split is #1 for third week, Rings #2

For the weekend of February 3-5, 2017, M. Night Shyamalan's Split managed to stay #1 for the third week in a row. I hope he and James McAvoy had decent back-end percentage deals because they should make a lot of money from this movie, which had a modest $9 million production budget.

Of the new releases, Rings did best. For it to be yanked out of October and dumped here was the first signal it probably wasn't good. Its current 5% at RottenTomatoes would indicate it's going to disappear fast from theaters.

The Space Between Us was originally going to open in August, then December, and now finally here. Its 18% RottenTomatoes score tells me it'll disappear even faster than Rings.

Robert DeNiro's labor of love, The Comedian, opened on less than 900 screens and it still had a lower per-screen average than The Space Between Us.

Of the holdovers, Oscar darlings Hidden Figures and La La Land are still finding audiences. I'm rooting for Arrival to cross the $100 million domestic mark; it'll probably get there once it hits more discount theaters.

Where the current nine best picture nominees stand:

Hidden Figures - $119.4 million
La La Land - $118.3 million
Arrival - $98.64 million
Hacksaw Ridge - $66.36 million
Fences - $52.71 million
Manchester by the Sea - $43.91 million
Hell or High Water - $27.01 million
Lion - $24.71 million
Moonlight - $19.64 million

Opens February 10
LEGO BATMAN MOVIE with the voices of Will Arnett, Zach Galifianakis and Jenny Slate.
FIFTY SHADES DARKER with Dakota Johnson, Jamie Dornan and Marcia Gay Harden.
JOHN WICK 2 with Keanu Reeves, Ian McShane, John Leguizamo and Laurence Fishburne.

Last Vegas - DVD Review

Starring Michael Douglas, Robert DeNiro, Morgan Freeman, Kevin Kline, Mary Steenbergen, Romany Malco, Jerry Ferrara, Roger Bart, Joanna Gleason and Michael Ealy.
Directed by Jon Turteltaub.

★★

A movie with this cast would have been the must-see movie of 1989. Nowadays we know what we're going to get. Its humor is broad and safe. It reminded me of when Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas had their one last hurrah in 1986's Tough Guys. Nothing too demanding, and a lot of that may be because Hollywood has no idea how to write good parts for older people unless it involves dying.

So these four Academy-Award winners play four old friends who reunite for a bachelor party when the one of them who's never been married is finally getting married. Douglas is the lifelong playboy marrying a woman half his age; DeNiro is the widower who's closed himself off from life; Freeman's the bored grandpa who's tired of taking it easy after his stroke; and Kline is the persnickety one whose wife tells him he can have a freebie if he wants (as long as he doesn't tell her about it.)

So they party, they get drunk, they each have their epiphany, and we probably would have been more entertained listening to the four of them swap movie-making stories for two hours.

Ender's Game is #1

For the weekend of November 1-3, 2013.

1.  Ender's Game - $28 million - 1 wk (LG)
 . . . 3407 screens / $8218 per screen
2.  Jackass Presents Bad Grandpa - $20.5 ($62.06) - 2 wks (Par) -36%
 . . . 3345 / $6129
3.  Last Vegas - $16.52 - 1 wk (CBS)
 . . . 3065 / $5390
4.  Free Birds - $16.2 - 1 wk (Rel)
 . . . 3736 / $4336
5.  Gravity - $13.13 ($219.2) - 5 wks (WB) -34.8%
 . . . 3024 / $4342
6.  Captain Phillips - $8.5 ($82.55) - 4 wks (Sony) -27%
 . . . 3021 / $2814
7.  12 Years a Slave - $4.6 ($8.76) - 3 wks (FS) +115.5%
 . . . 410 / $11,220
8.  Cloudy with Meatballs 2 - $4.2 ($106.2) - 6 wks (Sony) -33.1%
 . . . 2430 / $1728
9.  Carrie - $3.4 ($31.97) - 3 wks (SG) -43.2%
 . . . 2252 / $1510
10. The Counselor - $3.25 ($13.37) - 2 wks (Fox) -58.6%
 . . . 3044 / $1068
11. Escape Plan - $2.28 ($21.6) - 3 wks (LG) -50%
 . . . 1966 / $1160
12. About Time - $1.1 - 1 wk (U)
 . . . 175 / $6286

Despite all the controversy around boycotting the movie, Ender's Game had a solid debut.  Last Vegas also has to be see as a success with its $28 million budget.  Now had it opened 20 years ago with that cast - Douglas, DeNiro, Freeman, Kline - it probably would have been one of the biggest movies of the year.

Free Birds had a weak opening but might benefit from being Thanksgiving month. Reviews haven't been kind.

Silver Linings Playbook - Movie Review

Starring Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, Robert DeNiro, Jacki Weaver, Chris Tucker, Julia Stiles, John Ortiz and Shea Whigham.  Directed by David O. Russell.

★★★½

This movie is essentially a well-made romantic comedy.  Quirky characters trying to find happiness.  But it's so well-made, it doesn't feel formula until we get to the finale and then go "Ah." But by then we're really rooting for everyone to succeed.

Cooper gives a career-best performance as Pat, a bipolar man who's just been released to his parents' care after eight months of institutionalization.  He went in for violently beating his wife's lover after catching them in the act.  But "he's better now" and determined to win his wife back.

He winds up becoming friends with Tiffany (Lawrence), sister-in-law of his best friend.  Tiffany has her own issues, having dealt with the death of her husband by sleeping with everyone at her office and getting herself fired.

The bizarre relationship of Pat and Tiffany works because the chemistry between Cooper and Lawrence is electric.  Not only that, but Robert DeNiro as Pat's father gives his best performance in about fifteen years.

It's just a terrific feel-good movie done with more skill than usual.

Killer Elite - DVD Review

★★

Starring Jason Statham, Clive Owen, Robert DeNiro, Dominic Purcell, Aden Young, Yvonne Strahovski, Ben Mendelsohn and Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje.
Directed by Gary McKendry.

Jason Statham plays an expert assassin brought out of retirement who must kill a group of war criminals in exchange for the life of his mentor/friend (Robert DeNiro). But an ex-SAS agent (Clive Owen) is on his trail to stop him.

Thoughts I had through the movie:

"Jason Statham was born to play characters named Danny."

"Don't know who this guy is they've tied to the chair, but to me, he's the British Daniel Baldwin."

"Alkaseltzer Akawaka-Ajablahblah would probably have a more successful movie career if he'd use a more pronouncable name. I've seen it spelled out dozens of times and can never remember it. He was cool as Eko on Lost."

"Nice to see Yvonne Strahovski getting work outside of the Chuck universe."

"Wait a minute, that guy with the long hair and mutton chops is the guy from Prison Break! Wow, he looks different. Good for him."

"Why is this being lit like it's a sequel to Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever?"

"Clive Owen's mustache looked silly in the trailer, but it's actually working for me here."

"This setup is very similar to Munich, but these two movies are worlds apart. Which makes me wonder if this movie would be leagues better if Spielberg had directed it."

"Very cool car-chase sequence marred by one guy on the team doing two very stupid things in a row. One, okay. Two? How did he wind up on the team?"

"Gotta love it when movies pretend to be over at the 80-minute mark. Who they foolin'?"

"100-minute mark. Really ready for this muddled movie to be over."

"I wonder how much DeNiro was paid for what looks like about a week of work. More of an extended cameo than a supporting role."

"Ugh, Statham actually had to say 'You just don't get it, do you?' to someone."

Random Movie News 9/15/11

- Robert DeNiro and Diane Keaton will star in The Big Wedding, about a long-divorced couple who are forced to pretend they're still happily married at their son's wedding. It co-stars Katherine Heigl, Amanda Seyfried, Topher Grace, Ben Barnes, Susan Sarandon and Robin Williams. It's slated to open October 19, 2012.

- Hugh Grant has joined the ensemble Cloud Atlas, starring Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Hugo Weaving, Jim Broadbent, Susan Sarandon, Ben Whishaw and Bae Doona. It's about people from different time periods, narrators that "hear each other's echoes down the corridor of history."

- Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Game of Thrones) will join Jessica Chastain (The Help, The Debt) in Mama, a horror movie from producer Guillermo Del Toro.

- Director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo (28 Weeks Later) is close to signing on for the remake of Highlander.

- Seth Rogen will co-write, co-producer, co-direct The Apocalypse with longtime partner Evan Goldberg. It'll star Rogen as well as James Franco, Jonah Hill and Jay Baruchel, playing themselves locked in a house while the apocalypse happens outside, but the longer they're holed up, the more they get on each other's nerves.

Limitless - DVD Review

lll

Starring Bradley Cooper, Robert DeNiro, Abbie Cornish, Anna Friel, Johnny Whitworth and Robert Burke. Directed by Neil Burger.

When a movie has such a good idea, I'm really rooting for them to be creative with it and take me places I didn't anticipate. While it never surprised me, other than one dumb move, this character handled his new powers pretty much the same way I'd like to think I would.

Bradley Cooper plays Eddie, a would-be novelist who's in a funk. He just can't seem to get his wheels spinning in life. But he's offered a chance. He's given an experimental pill that'll let him access 100% of his brain capacity. He takes it, and he's suddenly a genius.

The movie deals slickly with the boost of intelligence, and with the subtext of addiction. The science... meh, who cares, let's enjoy the ride. It's a great "what if" premise that ventures down some dangerous roads when some deadly people hunt him down to get their hands on his drug.

Righteous Kill - Movie Review

RIGHTEOUS KILL (**1/2) - Starring Robert DeNiro, Al Pacino, John Leguizamo, Donnie Wahlberg, Carla Gugino, Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson and Brian Dennehy.
Directed by Jon Avnet.

See it for the treat of watching DeNiro and Pacino act together in one movie, but it's no Heat. It's nowhere near Heat.

The two men have made some poor choices since their 1995 teaming. They've both had good projects too, but I can't help but look at DeNiro and think "15 Minutes? Hide & Seek?" or at Pacino and wonder "Two for the Money? 88 Minutes?"

I read the original script called for Pacino's character to be a couple decades younger than DeNiro's, and that makes sense. Pacino keeps joking that DeNiro's his role model, things like that. In real life, Al has a couple years on Robert.

It seems a series of criminals who have been getting off on technicalities have been getting murdered, and the killer leaves behind poems. So the cynical cops investigating don't mind the bad guys getting snuffed, but they recognize they have a serial killer out there and they need to stop him. It doesn't take long (and the preview gives this away) for them to figure out that the killer must be a cop as well.

Having seen two Avnet movies within a week of each other (the other being 88 Minutes), I noticed something exploitive about how he treats his women. 88 Minutes had a killer who likes to string his women up and cut them, so that they slowly bleed to death while he's raping them. There's only one main female character in Righteous Kill, and she's a cop who likes rough sex, insomuch that we first think she's getting brutally raped before we find out she's just roleplaying. Carla Gugino must have read the script and muttered, "The things I do to get to work with DeNiro..."

(Which reminds me of the American Express commercial of Tina Fey trying to meet with Martin Scorsese. "I may miss my chance to get kicked to death in a movie." But I digress.)

Righteous Kill was one of those movies where we get an obvious red herring, a more subtle red herring, and then who I thought the actual killer is. But it actually wound up being the subtle red herring. I thought the subtle red herring was too obvious, but with mysteries, I guess it's pretty hard these days to surprise audiences with whodunit.