MAKING A KILLING: Movie Reviews of The Killing of a Sacred Deer and Murder on the Orient Express by Howard Casner

First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new consultation service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00.  For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you.  I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one. 

 

Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay?  FosCheck out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013.  Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r

 

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Warning: SPOILERS

When I saw writer/director Yorgos Lanthimos and writer Efthymis Filippou’s earlier film Dogtooth, I must be honest and say I didn’t have the most favorable reaction and many might consider that odd.

I felt it a rather dated attack on middle class mores that had already been done to death in the 1950’s and 60’s, especially in the off-Broadway theater.

But then I saw The Lobster, their last film, an hysterical satire and social commentary on love and relationships and the society that promotes them.

And now I’ve seen their latest, The Killing of a Sacred Deer, and I realized I was partially right about my earlier analysis because the more I see of their work, the more I realize the turgid social commentary of those decades are not their main influences. Rather, these two artists are the 21st Century embodiment of the existentialist/theater of the absurd practitioners like Beckett, Ionesco, Sartre, Albee and others of that ilk.

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LIFE’S A BEACH: Movie Review of Dunkirk by Howard Casner

First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new consultation service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00.  For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you.  I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one. 

Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay?  Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013.  Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r

 

and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE

 

Warning: SPOILERS

Is Dunkirk, writer/director Christopher Nolan’s version of one of the biggest military disasters of all time that, somehow, near miraculously, became a symbol of one of the biggest military triumphs of all time, any good?

Or does that matter and the movie, at least at this moment in time, is somewhat beyond criticism?

The film is certainly a monumental achievement, but ironically its due to Nolan’s minimalist approach to drama, with little dialog, no backstory and vistas of groups of soldiers lined up along the beach as if they were waiting for a bus. Read the rest of this entry »


ASHES TO ASHES: Movie review of Cinderella by Howard Casner

First, a word from our sponsors. Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r

 

and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE

 

Warning: SPOILERS

cinderellaThere is one absolutely lovely and magical moment in the new live action, non-musical Disney version of the animated, fully musicalized Disney version of the classic Charles Perrault fairy tale Cinderella.

Our titular character, frustrated and defeated by the cruel treatment at the hands of her step-mother and step-sisters, takes to horse and rides off into a distant woods where she stops the Prince from hunting down a stag.

What’s wonderful about this scene is that the previously optimistic (and rather annoyingly Pollyanish at times) Cinderella is finally the person she really is, beaten down, sad, furious at the circumstances she has found herself in, while the Prince, in turn, is finally the person he isn’t: here he pretends to be a mere apprentice and not royalty.

Who’d have thought something this sophisticated, clever and witty would have come from a carefully fine-tuned and micromanaged to the nth degree movie from the Disney studios, but the screenwriter Chris Weitz (who has given us such fun bon bons as Antz and About a Boy) pulled off something of a coup in this particular scene.

Other than that, for my money, Cinderella is something of a mixed bag when it comes to success. I know it’s been socking it away at the box office, but I’m afraid that it only intermittently works for me. Read the rest of this entry »


Moview Review of JACK RYAN: SHADOW RECRUIT by Howard Casner

For those who don’t think that there is something incredibly whacked when it comes to the values of Hollywood, submitted for your consideration (cause, yeah, it does seem kind of Twilight Zonish at times):

 

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit is a movie in which Keira Knightley, the marvelous purse-lipped actress of Pride and Prejudice (for which she received an Oscar nomination), Atonement and Never Let Me Go (as well as the mega-franchise pirate movie Pirates of the Caribbean, et al.) is made to play second fiddle as the long suffering girlfriend to…Chris Pine.  Chris Pine.

 

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit is a movie in which Kevin Costner, who, though definitely not a great actor, has given marvelous performances in such films as Bull Durham, Tin Cup and A Perfect World, has been Oscar nominated for his performance in Dances With Wolves, and has become a solid character actor as of late in other such films as The Upside of Anger and Hatfields & McCoys, is made to play second fiddle as an Obi-Wan Kenobi type to…Chris Pine.  Chris Pine.

 

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit is a movie in which Kenneth Branagh, who once had a career trajectory as the new Laurence Olivier after directing and starring in such films as Henry V, Hamlet and Much Ado About Nothing, is made to play second fiddle as a James Bond villain in a non-James Bond movie to, as well as direct…Chris Pine.  Chris Pine.

 

Jack  Ryan: Shadow Recruit is a movie in which I don’t know how many kazillions of dollars were spent in order to revolve a film and franchise around…Chris Pine.  Chris Pine.

 

Now, Chris Pine is very attractive, very handsome.  But he’s also a bit bland with not a lot of screen charisma outside his looks.  Stanislavski is definitely not his strong suit.

 

But for some reason, Hollywood has been insistent on trying to make huge stars out of a series of, well I won’t say “himbos”, because that’s really kind of rude and mean (and probably not fair), but, well, handsome, cut and chiseled, but somewhat mediocre performers who don’t really have the acting chops to fully justify it.

 

And you know who I mean Chris Hemsworth, brother Liam, Chris Evans, Taylor Kitsch and others (and if you don’t believe me, are you really telling me that you think Hemsworth, Evans and Hiddleston gave better performances or even came close to the ones given by Jeremy Renner, Mark Ruffalo, Robert Downey, Jr. and Scarlett Johansson in The Avengers?)  Which reminds me, whatever happened to Casper Van Diem anyway?

 

And I guess I am being a bit more than unfair.  Pine certainly doesn’t give a bad performance.  He just doesn’t give all that interesting a one.  He doesn’t hurt the film by any means (and it’s not exactly the kind of film that he, or anyone, could really hurt, exactly).  And I probably wouldn’t have minded so much if he hadn’t been surrounded by a group of thespians who deserve a lot better.

 

And it’s not even that bad a movie.  It is very entertaining and you do get caught up in it and want to know how it’s all going to turn out.  The screenplay by Adam Cozad (his first) and David Koepp (who started off his career with the marvelous Apartment Zero before he got sidetracked into doing blockbusters) is actually rather clever and a lot of fun at times.  It’s closer to the kind of plot that the Mission: Impossible movies should be using.

 

And to their credit the screenwriting duo gives us two incredibly exciting action sequences, and I don’t mean the fight in the hotel room that destroys a bidet (no, not the bidet) or the rip roaring finale in New York’s Wall Street.

 

No, in actuality, the highlights of this movie, the most suspenseful and tense moments, is a claustrophobic scene in a van where everyone is desperately using modern computer technology to figure out where a terrorist attack is going to be, and a discussion of Russian literature between Knightley and Branagh.

 

Branagh’s direction on the other hand tends to match Pine’s performance more than his own.  It’s a bit bland as well and does little more than get the job done, while his portrayal of Ryan’s antagonist is a much more nuanced and interesting piece of work (I guess it’s good to be the boss).

 

So in the end, Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit is a perfectly acceptable piece of entertainment.

 

But, yeah, I also think it demonstrates that Hollywood’s values are seriously out of whack.