I’ve Seen The End, I’ve Seen The Beginning

The title sounds promising, am I right?  Intriguing and odd, appealing to fans of offbeat indie flicks and hipsters who pride themselves on thinking outside the box.  I admit the name caught my attention (no, I’m not a hipster, thank you for asking), much more than the title of the short story on which it’s based: “Kneller’s Happy Campers” by Etgar Keret.  But, while it is everything the title suggests, and is mildly entertaining, I can’t come up with a good reason why it’s on Entertainment Weekly’s “The 50 Best Movies You’ve Never Seen” list.

Wristcutters: A Love Story is about a young man, Zia (Patrick Fugit) who commits suicide after his girlfriend breaks up with him.  Once deceased, he resides in a particular place in the afterlife reserved for people who’ve committed suicide that is just like life, “only a little worse,” where he works at a pizza joint and becomes besties with Eugene, a Russian musician who “offed” by electrocuting himself onstage immediately following a gig.  Shea Whigham plays Eugene and he and Fugit have reasonably decent chemistry as two very unlikely friends.  When Zia learns that the girl who broke his heart and led him to slit his wrists, the lovely Desiree (Leslie Bibb), subsequently killed herself and is now looking for Zia, he and Eugene set off in Eugene’s pos car to find her.  Along the way, they pick up Mikal (Shannyn Sossamon), a beautiful girl who claims she’s landed in suicide purgatory by mistake and is seeking the “People In Charge” to appeal her case.  They cross paths with a few unusual characters and eventually find something better than what they originally sought.

It’s a good premise and an effective hook but the problem is, once it has you, it doesn’t exactly know what to do with you.  Patrick Fugit is damned delightful (why isn’t he in more things?) and the performances are good enough but the story itself leaves much to be desired.  Tom Waits has a small but seemingly significant role – I say “seemingly” because he plays Kneller, leader of a sort of commune called “Kneller’s Happy Campers,” who eventually helps Zia find Desiree and even inadvertently helps Mikal find the PIC but his character and place in the story is so bizarrely surreal, it feels much less important than it should.  Mark Boone Junior (of Sons of Anarchy fame), Nick Offerman and Will Arnett all have cameos but even they fall relatively flat.  The humor is mediocre, the plot weak and the resolution, while not exactly disappointing, is far from gratifying.  And that’s the biggest problem with Wristcutters: it never gets you invested enough in either the story or its characters to evoke any real emotion.  It’s just merely okay.

I’ve certainly seen worse movies and at 88 minutes in length, it won’t waste much of your time.  But I can’t say I recommend it.  There are many more satisfying ways to spend an hour and a half.

~Nikki

More Than Words

How does one find the words to discuss the film, The Words?  This is a tricky one to talk about, as the good and bad cancel each other out to equal my least favorite of all emotions when it comes to entertainment, the dreaded “MEH.”

Bradley Cooper and Zoe Saldana star as Rory and Dora, a young (and ungodly beautiful) couple trying to make ends meet in NYC, while Rory fulfills his dream of becoming a published author.  This is no easy task, and the strain takes its toll on them both.  Dora is crazy supportive though, and before long, they get married.  They shoot off to Paris for a honeymoon (despite the fact that narrator Dennis Quaid – in a moment that perfectly exemplifies where this flick fails – just finished explaining how poor these two are), where Dora finds this gorgeous old leather case that she buys for her new husband as a kind of wedding present.  Some time later, back at home, Rory discovers a weathered-looking, typed manuscript in one of the folds of the case, clearly overlooked by Dora and the shop owner who sold it to her.  This film’s greatest success lies right here, in these moments of wonder and discovery wherein Rory, the writer struggling tirelessly to find his voice, to come into his own and gain success at his chosen craft, becomes so captivated by this hidden work that he decides to preserve it by typing it all out on his computer.  At this point, his intentions are only to see in on the screen and to keep it from being lost again.  A day or two later, he enters his apartment to find an emotional Dora who showers him with praise for the beautiful work she saw on his computer and read without his permission but it was so compelling she couldn’t help herself and finally! it’s the kind of story she always knew he had in him, the depth and beauty she never doubted was there and now he finally released it onto the page!  Rory begins to contradict her, to explain that the work isn’t his, but who can resist such ardent enthusiasm?  In a moment of profound weakness, Rory allows her to believe the story is his.

Dora eventually convinces Rory to submit it to his publisher and he foolishly gives in.  Somehow, Bradley Cooper and directors Brian Klugman and Lee Sternthal manage to convey Rory’s insecurity and doubt, his being swept away in the search for recognition and success.  Because he isn’t just some schmuck who steals someone else’s work and passes it off as his own.  Yes, he does present this work by an unknown author as his story and he does gain tremendous success from it but his drive for doing so – his longing for the success he never reached on his own and the years of relentless hard work without reward somehow make it seem understandable.  That is, until the day an older gentleman approaches him in the park and begins to tell him a story, his story, in fact, that so closely resembles the one Rory printed and published and for which, he is now famous.

Jeremy Irons plays the nameless old man whose work is ripped off and he is such a captivating presence on screen, Cooper’s performance suffers by comparison.  Anyone who has seen Silver Linings Playbook knows that Bradley Cooper is capable of truly great acting but in The Words, he doesn’t quite deliver.  The real defect of the movie, however, lies in the third layer of this story, the one containing the narrator.  Remember the narrator?  The famous, adored present-day author Clay Hammonds (Quaid) tells us Rory’s story and it quickly becomes obvious that Hammonds is the real-life Rory, telling his story to a star-struck lit student, Daniella (Olivia Wilde), making this a story within a story within a story, which sounds so much more interesting than it is.  It would have been leaps and bounds more enjoyable without the Quaid-Wilde layer, which added nothing to the story itself and whose scenes felt like filler, a useless distraction.

The Words isn’t a total waste of time; it’s just one of many films that aims higher than its reach.  Much like its leading character, it wants and strives for a level of greatness that simply isn’t there.

~Annie & Nikki

If You’re Warm, Then You Can’t Relate To Me

Ah, the zombie apocalypse.  It has become its own genre in American pop culture.  How many books and films have been written and produced about people trying to survive in a post-zombie-apocalyptic world?  Countless stories have been told, most of them dramatic, many action-packed, some with social statements woven in and others with comedy interspersed.  Which got me thinking that pretty much everything that could be done with the zombie genre has been done.  And then came along Warm Bodies.  And I realized that just because I couldn’t imagine anything new to bring to the genre, that certainly doesn’t mean that no one else could.

Warm Bodies isn’t all that original a story when compared to, say, any typical romantic comedy.  What sets it apart is that it combines the zombie genre with the romantic comedy genre – two seemingly incompatible kinds of stories – and it does it, somehow, well.  The film is narrated by a fellow whose name, he thinks, begins with the letter R.  Beyond that, he can’t remember.  Because, you see, at some point prior to the beginning of the story, R was bitten and infected and turned into a zombie.  Yes, the zombie apocalypse arrived, infecting millions, killing millions of others and changing the landscape of human society and relationships as we know it.  The initial wave of zombies created by whatever unnamed cause are completely and utterly lost to it, eventually becoming little more than skeletons incapable of any thought or drive beyond hunting and seeking food in the form of human flesh.  But some of the folks who are bitten later, such as our main protagonist R, manage to retain some small hint of cognition, some tiny remnant of their former human selves.  In search of food, R encounters Julie, an uninfected human and daughter of the leader of the community of remaining unscathed survivors.  For reasons he doesn’t understand, he saves Julie from other zombies rather than eating her himself and develops, well, a sort of crush on her.

And here’s the thing.  As a scientist who has studied infectious epidemics, it almost makes sense.  Because there is just the smallest hint of truth in the very basic foundation of it.  You see, the thing that makes a novel infectious agent (virus, bacteria, etc.) so potentially lethal to humans isn’t just related to that particular agent’s ability to cause disease – its newness makes it cause a worse disease.  The reason being that our imperfect bodies have much more trouble fighting off something they’ve never seen before.  Our immune systems are more easily overtaken by a microbe the first time it encounters it.  This has happened throughout history with the influenza virus, smallpox, measles, pertussis (which causes whooping cough) and countless others.  The second and third waves of people to encounter these organisms fare better.  Not that there are no casualties, but they tend to occur in smaller numbers than their predecessors.  Warm Bodies plays on this phenomenon to create a particular kind of zombie – the kind that isn’t entirely overtaken by whatever virus or pathogen led to its becoming a zombie.  The first wave of people to become infected with the zombie disease is ruined by it.  They lose every shred of their humanity, all memory, their capacity for emotion and any instinct other than hunger.  After some unspecified length of time, newly infected people, while still turning into flesh-eating zombies, form a bit of resistance.  They retain the minutest amount of cognitive thought and can even mutter monosyllabic words.  This resistance is encouraged by emotion (love, especially) and has the potential to “cure” the zombie of its being a zombie and return it to a human state of being.

Author Isaac Marion wrote the book on which screenwriter/director Jonathan Levine based the movie and though I haven’t read the novel, I have heard that the meat of the story is the same.  The flick is silly and light-hearted, not to be taken too seriously, and for the most part, it works, at least in part due to the performances from its two lead actors, Nicholas Hoult as the zombie, R, and Teresa Palmer as the girl who inspires his heart to beat again, Julie.  Hoult and Palmer play their respective roles with surprising charm and their chemistry together really sells it, making it almost believable that the spark between them is powerful enough to triumph over the zombie plague.  John Malkovich adequately plays the part of Julie’s father and leader of the small army of remaining people trying to salvage what they can of the pre-zombie world, and Rob Corddry, who plays M, a kind of friend of R’s who is inspired by the bond that develops between R and Julie, is delightfully funny.  Dave Franco and Analeigh Tipton also offer charming side characters who get more than a few laughs.

What makes Warm Bodies even easier to enjoy is the certain fact that it never takes itself too seriously.  There are sober, heartfelt moments that touch places of real emotion but the film doesn’t try too hard to make you cry.  Neither does it make any attempt at social commentary or satire, nor aspire to be an outright comedy.  Instead, it is a thoroughly enjoyable and harmonious blend of love story and light comedy that just happens to be set against the backdrop of the zombie plague.

Can’t wait to see what else they can do with this genre.

~Nikki

I’m Scared Of What’s Behind And What’s Before

Imagine a life without a career.  With success that’s measured by your own peace and contentedness rather than money or possessions.  Imagine a life wherein you share your best, most intimate moments with others like you, people who’ve positively impacted your life and for whom you care, deeply.  Imagine not waking to an alarm, not balancing your checkbook, not competing with co-workers for peak season vacation days.  Imagine living on a piece of land whose beauty shocks and inspires you and whose fertility feeds and sustains you.  Such is the life young Martha seeks and finds on a gorgeous little farmhouse in New England.  But such a life comes with its own hardships, and with great compromise.

Such is the story writer and director Sean Durkin slowly and beautifully unfolds in the disquieting Martha Marcy May Marlene.  The film is slowly paced but never does it lose you.  On the contrary, it dishes out its story in increments, each one hooking you a little more, a little more until you’re so engrossed, you’re leaning close to catch every word and trying to notice every minute detail so as not to miss a beat.

John Hawkes plays Patrick, the apparent leader of a commune-style farmhouse wherein several young men and women voluntarily live, including the flick’s protagonist, Martha (Elizabeth Olson).  Patrick wears the same white V-neck in nearly every scene, a paper thin shirt that shows every dip in his sternum, the veins in his arms more prominent than his stringy muscles, giving him the look of a weasel which suits his character well except when he masterfully delivers his lines.  His words have the bold sound of forthcoming honesty but in fact hide something sinister, a cleverly manipulative trick in every sentence that allows him to simultaneously gain the trust of and assert dominance over the pack of barely adult kids he’s amassed.  In the first few minutes, we see Martha leave the farmhouse in the quiet hours of early morning.  She hides in the woods while her companions chase after her and calls her sister once she reaches a pay phone.  Her sister, Lucy (Sarah Paulson), picks her up and takes her to her home in Connecticut, some three hours away.  Soon, it’s revealed that Martha (called Marcy May by her farmhouse cohabitants) has been estranged from her big sister for a couple of years.

The movie cuts back and forth between the present and the recent past, slowly piecing together Martha’s life at the commune and her life with her sister, two lifestyles that couldn’t be more different.  As you may have already guessed, the group of young people at the farmhouse is, essentially, a cult led by Patrick whose presence is nothing if not chilling.  It is unclear what drove Martha to such a place and made her vulnerable to its manipulations but she is fairly effectively brain washed while there and Olson’s performance offers a painfully real look at the kind of dissociative personality disorder she develops from it.  She tries to function as a normal part of society once back with her sister but can’t quite get it right and when Lucy rightfully lashes out at her for behaving inappropriately, Martha sharply alternates between pitiful apologies and sharp-tongued insults.  One of the many things she learned with Patrick is how to hurt and trick using nothing but words.

Martha Marcy May Marlene is a quiet powerhouse of a film offering gorgeous scenery and exceptional performances.  It didn’t get a lot of publicity and I understand why; it doesn’t have mass appeal.  But it is a gem of a film and not only film students and cinemaphiles will love it.  Everyone who enjoys a good story well-told will be pleased.  It’s far from a feel-good movie.  But its themes revolving around relationships and identity will resonate with you; its haunting images and outstanding performances will stick with you long after the movie’s end.

~Nikki