JohnDeSando
Joined Oct 2001
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"Dog is a man's (Woman's) best friend." Old Saying
Having Manhattan isn't as easy as it was when Woody Allen called it up with a Greenwich Village tracking shot or a lilting jazz background, but writer/directors Scott McGehee and David Siegel have captured it in a modest drama about at middle-aged writer/teacher Iris (Naomi Watts) lamenting the loss of her best pal, author/writer/teacher Walter (Bill Murray).
As she questions why he committed suicide, she also deals with his bequeathing her his magnificent great Dane, Apollo. The lyrical study of grief is a tone set by Murray's easy-going delivery and her gentle nature. As Murray did in Lost in Translation, the drama has enough subtle melancholy to endear him and her to the audience as it sees ways to deal with loss outside the confines of a funeral.
Although Apollo brings a regal mien and playful attitude to the sometimes-somber moment, it is Iris's low-key reactions that keep the drama from being mawkish. Yet, she must be active as she fights to keep her rent-controlled apartment for her and Apollo as well as her sanity in the recurring interaction with her thoughts of the deceased Walter.
He was an old-school author, whose dalliances with students like Iris finally caught up with ethics, and he exited academia with students like her the better of for knowing him. But what to do with the dog? Although no substitute for the brilliant Walter, who read regularly to Apollo, Iris learns to fight for herself about her apartment and her need to continue writing without Walter hanging about her.
As in Mark Sutherland's Abby's List, the "dogumentary" is often about the owners while the canine support serves as facilitator for self-discovery. As also in Pengin Lessons. Where Steve Coogan's penguin brings out his humanity, The Friend is about just that-humans becoming human through animals.
The Friend is simple and benign, a luxurious few hours of contemplation about our place in the universe and NYC all at once. It's not Woody, but it does well enough.
Having Manhattan isn't as easy as it was when Woody Allen called it up with a Greenwich Village tracking shot or a lilting jazz background, but writer/directors Scott McGehee and David Siegel have captured it in a modest drama about at middle-aged writer/teacher Iris (Naomi Watts) lamenting the loss of her best pal, author/writer/teacher Walter (Bill Murray).
As she questions why he committed suicide, she also deals with his bequeathing her his magnificent great Dane, Apollo. The lyrical study of grief is a tone set by Murray's easy-going delivery and her gentle nature. As Murray did in Lost in Translation, the drama has enough subtle melancholy to endear him and her to the audience as it sees ways to deal with loss outside the confines of a funeral.
Although Apollo brings a regal mien and playful attitude to the sometimes-somber moment, it is Iris's low-key reactions that keep the drama from being mawkish. Yet, she must be active as she fights to keep her rent-controlled apartment for her and Apollo as well as her sanity in the recurring interaction with her thoughts of the deceased Walter.
He was an old-school author, whose dalliances with students like Iris finally caught up with ethics, and he exited academia with students like her the better of for knowing him. But what to do with the dog? Although no substitute for the brilliant Walter, who read regularly to Apollo, Iris learns to fight for herself about her apartment and her need to continue writing without Walter hanging about her.
As in Mark Sutherland's Abby's List, the "dogumentary" is often about the owners while the canine support serves as facilitator for self-discovery. As also in Pengin Lessons. Where Steve Coogan's penguin brings out his humanity, The Friend is about just that-humans becoming human through animals.
The Friend is simple and benign, a luxurious few hours of contemplation about our place in the universe and NYC all at once. It's not Woody, but it does well enough.
"A Working Man"-hardly an accurate descriptor for tough-guy Jason Statham's new character, Levon Cade. As a former black-ops super star, he is more like a robotic savior of the working man and in this case, saving an abducted daughter of his boss Joe (Michael Pena). Nevertheless, he has chosen daily to leave his exalted rank in special forces to be a low-key construction foreman, whose past few know about.
Until the bad-boy Russian mafia enters his scene and he is dramatically called back to his killer way of life. Statham has evolved lethal characters from a simple transporter to a beekeeper, from a mindless operative to a citizen who reluctantly helps the needy, using those deadly skills from long ago.
In this manner, he has some value as a do-gooder, but beyond that he is simply a killing machine and his enemies, unapologetically Eastern-European, now are the once accursed enemy but beginning to look like co-conspirators in the world politic outside the film.
Talk about the world, films are paying attention more than ever to human trafficking from Liam Neeson and Denzel Washington to the holy studio Angel, whose Sound of Freedom sets a standard for smart anti trafficking drama. Because I find Statham a suitable heir to the Bronson, Stallone vigilante tradition (a writer and producer of A Working Man), we'll continue to review his films even when he has withdrawn on this thriller to dialogue-starved mayhem.
When he is more than a death dispenser, Statham's films have potential for insightful social commentary outside of the visceral satisfaction of simply shutting down world-wide mafia activity.
Until the bad-boy Russian mafia enters his scene and he is dramatically called back to his killer way of life. Statham has evolved lethal characters from a simple transporter to a beekeeper, from a mindless operative to a citizen who reluctantly helps the needy, using those deadly skills from long ago.
In this manner, he has some value as a do-gooder, but beyond that he is simply a killing machine and his enemies, unapologetically Eastern-European, now are the once accursed enemy but beginning to look like co-conspirators in the world politic outside the film.
Talk about the world, films are paying attention more than ever to human trafficking from Liam Neeson and Denzel Washington to the holy studio Angel, whose Sound of Freedom sets a standard for smart anti trafficking drama. Because I find Statham a suitable heir to the Bronson, Stallone vigilante tradition (a writer and producer of A Working Man), we'll continue to review his films even when he has withdrawn on this thriller to dialogue-starved mayhem.
When he is more than a death dispenser, Statham's films have potential for insightful social commentary outside of the visceral satisfaction of simply shutting down world-wide mafia activity.
After seeing over the years Robert De Niro star in gangster films such as Mean Streets, Goodfellas, Casino, and The Irishman, it's astonishing to see him play gangster fresh in The Alto Knights. Sure, we've seen most of his facial and vocal turns before, but never in two different mobsters in the same film with two distinct personalities.
Narrator Frank Costello (De Nir0) is an analytical businessman not wholly invested in being a mid-twentieth century icon; his former best friend from youth, Vito Genovese (De Niro), is a hot head bound to lead the mob in the US, regardless of his friendship with current mob head, Frank. To see De Niro play both nose to nose in negotiations is to see one of the great film actors of all time.
When you look into Frank's eyes, you see latent menace that has caused countless deaths. Looking at Vito's glasses, you don't have the depth but rather a surface violence, hardly hidden. A great actor brings both distinct personalities alive.
Director Barry Levinson also brings his memorable work with Bugsy and Wag the Dog while writer Nicholas Pileggi brings traces of success from Goodfellas and Casino. With the three pedigrees converging in The Alto Knights, you must expect greatness, and you get it, maybe not throughout but enough to say that if Coppola and Brando had also been involved, this film would have been incomparable.
Most scenes are intimate as Frank's wife Bobbie (Debra Messing), and he quietly map out their fate. More flamboyant is Vito's wife, Anna (Katherine Narducci), whose courtroom histrionics as she testifies against him is the stuff of in your face while it contrasts with De Niro's subtler approach (not his usual path). The variety of acting and its excellence makes this a gangster film you should not refuse.
Narrator Frank Costello (De Nir0) is an analytical businessman not wholly invested in being a mid-twentieth century icon; his former best friend from youth, Vito Genovese (De Niro), is a hot head bound to lead the mob in the US, regardless of his friendship with current mob head, Frank. To see De Niro play both nose to nose in negotiations is to see one of the great film actors of all time.
When you look into Frank's eyes, you see latent menace that has caused countless deaths. Looking at Vito's glasses, you don't have the depth but rather a surface violence, hardly hidden. A great actor brings both distinct personalities alive.
Director Barry Levinson also brings his memorable work with Bugsy and Wag the Dog while writer Nicholas Pileggi brings traces of success from Goodfellas and Casino. With the three pedigrees converging in The Alto Knights, you must expect greatness, and you get it, maybe not throughout but enough to say that if Coppola and Brando had also been involved, this film would have been incomparable.
Most scenes are intimate as Frank's wife Bobbie (Debra Messing), and he quietly map out their fate. More flamboyant is Vito's wife, Anna (Katherine Narducci), whose courtroom histrionics as she testifies against him is the stuff of in your face while it contrasts with De Niro's subtler approach (not his usual path). The variety of acting and its excellence makes this a gangster film you should not refuse.