12 YEARS A SLAVE: The Film Babble Blog Review

Now opening at a theater near me today, that is, exclusively in Raleigh at the Rialto Theater:




12 YEARS A SLAVE

(Dir. Steve McQueen, 2013)

12 YEARS A SLAVE, the third full length feature by 44-year old British filmmaker Steve McQueen, is going to be the movie that everybody feels that they absolutely have to see this season. But don’t go mistaking it for just another piece of big issue Oscar bait, for it’s a powerfully personal story driven by an exemplary performance that movie-goers will benefit greatly from experiencing.

The British born Chiwetel Ejiofor has shown he’s got the actorly goods before in numerous movie and television roles, but here he works his worry lines like never before as Solomon Northup, a New York native who was born free but kidnapped and sold into slavery in 1841.

The film, based on the real life Northup’s 1853 autobiography of the same name, focuses without shuddering on Northup, renamed Platt by his abductors, as he tries to survive unspeakable conditions for over a decade on a Louisiana cotton plantation.

Ejiofor’s Northup would get beaten, brutally lashed, if he protests that he’s not a slave so he resigns himself to the misery of the hand he’s been dealt, and, despite the movie posters showing him on the run, largely doesn’t try to escape (on an errand he take off through the woods at one point but runs into some evil white men hanging slaves and thinks the better of it).

McQueen (wish he’d use a middle initial or something so people would stop asking me if he’s *THE* Steve McQueen) populates his film with recognizable actor folk like Paul Giamatti as a cold slave trader, Benedict Cumberbatch as a slave owning preacher, Paul Dano as a particularly abusive foreman, and Michael Fassbender as the worst of the worst slave drivers who constantly refers to Northup and his people only as his “property.”

All the white people aren’t evil however as Cumberbatch appears to have some compassion, and Brad Pitt (one of the film’s co-producers) shows up as a wizened Canadian carpenter and abolitionist, who just may be able to help Northup out.

Aided by cinematographer Sean Bobbitt, who shot the director’s previous films, McQueen makes use of long takes and lingers on some shots in a effectively stirring manner that makes us feel what our poor protagonist is going through intensely. One scene, in which Dano strings up and attempts to lynch Northup, has our suffering lead left dangling with only the tips of his toes touching the ground as the other slaves continue their daily activities quietly behind him.

These harsh incidents are indeed hard to watch, but to fully appreciate the severity of what went down they are a vital necessity. Elements such as Adepero Oduye as one of Ejiofor’s fellow slaves crying uncontrollably over being separated from her children from one scene to the next are as harrowing and haunting as cinema can possibly achieve. Fassbender, who previously starred in McQueen’s SHAME, embodies a creature of pure cruelty so convincingly that you can feel the audience’s hatred of him in full force. There won’t be much sympathy for Sarah Paulson as his wife either, for she’s a wretched piece of wrong-minded menace as well.

Folks may compare it last year’s DJANGO UNCHAINED, but while they may share similar subject matter and may equal each other in the heavy abundance of the use of the “N-word,” Quentin Tarantino’s revisionist revenge fantasy was a cartoon compared to McQueen’s heartfelt and heartbreaking work here with its blindingly faithful to reality rawness.



12 YEARS A SLAVE is McQueen’s best film and one of the best of the year by far. It demands to be seen and felt by everybody who is unafraid to see and feel how somebody can endure such Hellish torture, and survive to tell their tale. It can seem like ancient history, especially as we now have a black President, but here we are reminded that it really wasn't that long ago that there were these horrible conditions in our country, and the repercussions of these injustices are still largely felt to this day. As Faulkner famously said, “The past is never dead. It's not even past.”



It seems these days, the only way to even begin to get past such horrors is to fully acknowledge them. The unflinchingly honest 12 YEARS A SLAVE is here to make it even harder to look the other way.



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The Lame, Almost Laugh Free LAST VEGAS Isn't Completely Lifeless At Least

Opening today at a multiplex near you:

LAST VEGAS (Dir. Jon Turteltaub, 2013)

Four Oscar winners - Michael Douglas, Morgan Freeman, Robert De Niro, and Kevin Kline - join together for a film that will win no Oscars. The famous foursome play friends since childhood (forget that their ages range from 66 to 76) who hit Vegas for some bachelor party shenanigans in this crappy comedy that critics everywhere are calling THE HANGOVER for the geriatric set.

I’m not a fan of THE HANGOVER movies, but they at least have more of an attempt at a narrative; LAST VEGAS just piles on a bunch of city of sin set-piece ideas (the guys judge a bikini competition, get in a bar fight, pretend to be mob bosses, etc.) that seem right off the top of the head of the film’s screenwriter Dan Fogleman (CARS, CRAZY STUPID LOVE, THE GUILT TRIP).

The bare as bones back story is that in their youth, Douglas and De Niro’s characters had been in a love triangle of sorts with a girl who chose De Niro. The gruff as ever De Niro is now a widower who’s angry at Douglas, now engaged to woman half his age, for not coming to his wife’s funeral.

Other loose story threads are that Kline has been given a “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas” card from his wife (Johanna Gleason) so he’s got a HALL PASS thing going on, and that Freeman is sneaking out on his overprotective son (Michael Ealy), who thinks his old man is going on a church retreat.

Another Oscar winner, Mary Steenburgen, pops up as a torch singer in a rundown lounge, all smiling and amused at the guy’s antics. Predictably Douglas and De Niro both fall for her in scenes devised to give the proceedings some emotional weight, but end up feeling shoehorned into this glib series of geezer sex gags.

There’s also the cringe-worthy scenario of the fellows bossing around Jerry Farrera (Turtle from Entourage). Their Parks Hotel concierge (Weeds’ Romany Malco) told Farrera that the guys are the heads of four crime syndicate families so he’d be scared into serving them. That obviously means that there’s terrible tough-guy jokes in the miserable mix to contend with too.

I have to say though, that castling Turtle does nail the air-headed Entourage guys-bonding-through-partying ethos the film is going for. The energy the leads put into their performances does elevate the flimsy material at times I also feel I should add.

But while it’s far from lifeless, LAST VEGAS is a lame, almost laugh-free, piece of PG-13 fluff that will please only incredibly undemanding crowds. 



It’s funny (funnier than anything in the movie, anyway) how Kline comes off like William H. Macy in WILD HOGS. That is, the one guy that you’d thought wouldn’t get caught slumming it up in such commercial dreck like this. However, more power to him because he looks like he’s having a better time than anybody else onscreen. I can't help thinking that his character and performance so deserve to be part of a much better movie.

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New Releases On Blu Ray & DVD: 10/29/13

This week, one of last summer’s biggest hits shares its home video release date with one of the summer’s biggest bombs: Dan Scanlon’s Pixar prequel MONSTER’S UNIVERSITY, which grossed over $700 million, and Robert Schwentke’s supernatural spoof R.I.P.D., which barely made back 10% of its $130 million budget. MONSTER’S UNIVERSITY, featuring Billy Crystal and John Goodman reprising their roles as Mike and Sullivan from 2002’s MONSTER’S, INC., is available in a 3 disc Blu ray edition (Blu-ray 3D + Blu-ray + DVD + Digital Copy), and on a single disc DVD. Special Features include a bunch of featurettes, Art Galleries, Promo Picks, the 7 minute animated short BLUE UMBRELLA, and a audio commentary with co-writer/director Scanlon, producer Kori Rae and story supervisor Kelsey Mann.

Amid lots of critic's cracks that it looked like a lame remake of MEN IN BLACK, I skipped R.I.P.D. along with the rest of civilization when it briefly played in theaters last July. The flop comedy starring Jeff Bridges and Ryan Reynolds as deceased policemen patrolling the afterlife is now out in spiffy 2 disc Blu ray (Blu-ray + DVD + Digital HD with UltraViolet) and 1 disc DVD editions. Special Features: Alternate Openings, Alternate/Deleted Scenes, over 30 minutes of featurettes, and Gag Reel.

Baille Walsh’s acclaimed 2012 rock doc about The Boss and his fans, SPRINGSTEEN & I, drops today in single disc Blu ray and DVD editions. Special Features include Springsteen’s Hard Rock Calling 2012 performance, in which Paul McCartney joins in with Bruce on “I Saw Her Standing There,” and “Twist and Shout”; 28 minutes of Fan Submissions, and over 10 minutes of “Meet the Fans.” Yep, this release is really fan-centric.


Also out today: Neil Jordan’s British-Irish Vampire film BYZANTIUM, Justin Kreutzmann’s concert film of tribute: Move Me Brightly: Celebrating Jerry Garcia's 70th Birthday, and Henry Saine’s sci-fi thriller BOUNTY KILLER.

On the older film out today front, there’s the Criterion Collection edition of Michelangelo Antonioni's 1961 classic LA NOTTE, Brian De Palma's 1978 cult horror flick THE FURY, Harold Cronk's Christmas comedy SILVER BELLS, and another title from the Pixar franchise division, CARS 3D: The Ultimate Collector's Edition.



TV series sets releasing this week: Christopher Guest's Family Tree: The Complete First Season, Degrassi Season 12, Line of Duty: Series 1, Damages: The Complete Series, and Agatha Christie's Poirot: Series 9.





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The Overlooked OWNING MAHOWNY Celebrates Its 10th Anniversary

Despite positive critical notice including a 4 star review from Roger Ebert who also listed it among 2003’s best films, Richard Kwietniowski’s OWNING MAHOWNY has been pretty overlooked in the decade since its release. I mean, if one thinks of Philip Seymour Hoffman in the early to mid Aughts, his roles in PUNCH DRUNK LOVE, 25TH HOUR, RED DRAGON, LOVE LIZA, and, of course, his real breakthrough CAPOTE will most likely will come to mind before his turn as the gambling addicted Canadian Dan Mahowny.

The character is based on Brian Molony, a clerk who embezzled millions from the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce to fund his gambling habit in the early ‘80s. Hoffman’s portrayal of Mahowny is one of a well dressed schlub who appears to only be comfortable when he’s sitting at a table in a casino playing blackjack, baccarat, roulette, or craps.

As a Atlantic City casino manager who wants to take full advantage of Hoffman’s habit, John Hurt observes that Mahowny only has the one true vice: “No sex, no booze, no drugs…our little roller is a purist. All he cares about is the next hand.”

That’s certainly the case when it comes to Hoffman’s girlfriend, Minnie Driver in a bad blonde wig, who is kept in the dark about his addiction until he takes her to Las Vegas and she realizes that his purpose there isn’t to propose to her.

OWNING MAHOWNY is shelved next to Wayne Kramer’s THE COOLER in my mental movie database for a couple of obvious reasons: they’re gambling movies that came out the same year, and they both star guys who were in Paul Thomas Anderson’s BOOGIE NIGHTS (1997). Both are also veterans of late ‘90s Coen Brothers’ movies (Hoffman in THE BIG LEBOWSKI; Macy in FARGO), which I bring up because Macy’s Jerry Lundegaard character in FARGO and Hoffman’s Mahowny have both gotten themselves entangled in huge financial problems. Macy isn’t a gambler in the gamer sense, but his poorly planned solutions involving his wife’s kidnapping and a sketchy real estate deal constitute some high stakes no matter which way you look at it.

However, Macy’s roles in FARGO and THE COOLER couldn’t be more different. His Lundegaaard is a conniving immoral jerk, while THE COOLER’s Bernie Lootz is a lovable yet extremely unlucky everyman. Hoffman would know immediately to steer clear of Macy the second his eyes fell upon him walking in the door of the fictional Shangri-La. Odds are that Alec Baldwin’s casino boss wouldn’t be as fascinated as Hurt is by Hoffman.

But let’s get back to the film in its own right. So as Hoffman’s Mahowny gets deeper and deeper into a hole, investigators are monitoring his every move. All the while Hoffman’s nonchalance and cold indifference to everything but the game is reflected in the cold sterile surroundings of the casinos and the bank’s board rooms. Thrown in the mix is Maury Chaykin in a great role as a sleazy bookie, who’s too stupefied by Hoffman’s business practices to resort to violence, even though he’s owed over 10 grand.

Mahowny never admits he has a gambling problem. “I have a…financial problem. A shortfall” is all he says about it when under interrogation. Hoffman well conveys the nature of a man who lives inside his head, taking his time to answer people’s questions in an aloof yet not awkward manner. The character could be seen as a comment on the unassuming, plainspoken personalities of Canadian gamblers, but the loneliness of this slave to the game is pure Hoffman,

OWNING MAHOWNY isn’t a masterpiece or even one of the best gambling movies out there, but it’s a well acted, neatly plotted, little sleeper that deserves a viewing. With its backdrop being that of the Canadian gambling industry we see the flashy side of the wheeling and dealing from behind the scenes where players are monitored by drably dressed men in charge. These elements are better seen as background fodder from one’s cozy safe home, rather than really experienced by risk takers in the raw.



Hoffman’s portrayal of Mahowny isn’t a star making turn or a revelation for the actor, but it’s a stepping stone of a role that led to greater heights – there’s little bit of the cold calculation of this character in his performance of the L. Ron Hubbard-ish Lancaster Dodd in last year’s misunderstood Paul Thomas Anderson epic THE MASTER for instance.

Hurt’s part as the on top of his game (and everyone else’s) casino kingpin is also pleasing, albeit in a very different tone and demeanor than Hoffman’s. It’s telling that the actor worked with writer/director Kwietniowski on the films LOVE AND DEATH ON LONG ISLAND (1997) and REGRET NOT SPEAKING (2011) before and after this production. A solid working relationship appears to be on ample display here.

OWNING MAHOWNY is a different kind of gambling movie than the usual razzle dazzle – one that breaks down the obsessive methods behind putting everything on the line.

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Blu Ray/DVD Review: BEFORE MIDNIGHT

Out today on Blu ray and DVD:

BEFORE MIDNIGHT

(Dir. Richard Linklater, 2013) *

“Where did you think your life would be at this point, Missy?” Ethan Hawke flippantly asks Julie Delpy early on in the third installment of Richard Linklaters’ ongoing saga of Jesse and Céline, the star-crossed lovers that we first met back in 1995’s BEFORE SUNRISE.

From Delpy’s remarks throughout BEFORE MIDNIGHT, we can guess that she didn’t expect that in her early 40s she’d be married to somebody she calls an “American teenager,” and that she’d be the mother of his curly haired blonde twin seven-year old girls (Charlotte and Jennifer Pryor).

But since they came together that afternoon in Paris they spent together in 2004’s BEFORE SUNSET that’s what happened, and now, nine years later, on vacation in Greece, they come to another crossroad in their relationship. Hawke’s successful novelist Jesse, is aching to spend more time with his teenage son (Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick) who lives with his mother in Chicago, but the French Delpy’s politically-minded Céline doesn’t want to leave France because of a government job offer.

Linklater (SLACKER, DAZED AND CONFUSED, BERNIE) effectively gets us back into the tone and the talkiness of the couple’s world with a long unbroken shot (taken from a camera mounted on the hood of their automobile) of the two chatting while driving through the Greek hillside while their children sleep in the back seat. We then meet a group of locals including Walter Lassally, Xenia Kalogeropoulou, Athina Rachel Tsangari, and Panos Koronis that join the leads for a lively dinner party, in which life and love is discussed with much wit and warmth.

This is a fine appetizer, but the real entrée is the last two thirds that concern Delpy and Hawke alone. They have a long walk and talk through Grecian ruins (another unbroken shot), in which Hawke notes that it’s been a long time since they’ve “walked around and bullsh*ted.” Then it’s on to an evening at Westin Resort Hotel at Costa Navarino which starts off romantically, but then becomes an edgy argument that could end their marriage.

Their heated hotel room feud put me through the emotional ringer, as it probably will anybody who’s enjoyed and/or suffered a long term relationship. Being the same age as they are (Hawke is 42; Delpy - 43), I can heavily relate to them as I’ve experienced almost identical arguments.

In both career best performances, Hawke and Delpy alternate between being funny, deeply frustrated, and heart-broken, never taking an inauthentic step (the fact that Delpy spends a good chunk of their hotel room spat topless is somehow organically present). Along with Linklater, Hawke and Delpy co-wrote the screenplay, so you often feel the overlap of real life in their exchanges and that makes the material sting and resonate greatly.

Some folks may be turned off by how talky it is – and it’s all talk; a series of constant conversations - but fans of these films are going to be elated to spend more time with these two, who, I believe, are in the running for greatest screen couple ever.

In a world full of major studio sequels and re-boots, it’s a beautiful treat that every nine years we can catch up with Jesse and Céline in an intelligent indie shot at another picturesque location. As BEFORE MIDNIGHT is on excellent par with the first two films, that prospect is even more appealing. Delpy recently said in an interview that they plan on making these films into their 60s, “then we’ll be like the couple in AMORE.” Amen to growing old with these characters.

Special Features: Commentary with Linklater, Hawke, and Delpy, a 7 minute featurette “Revisiting Jesse & Celine,” a 37-minute Q & A with Linklater, Hawke, and Delpy conducted by Film Critic Elvis Mitchell, and the theatrical trailer.

* Except for the last bit about bonus material, this review originally appeared in the June 14th, 2013 edition of the Raleigh News & Observer.

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New Releases On Blu Ray & DVD: 10/22/13

Last summer’s horror hit THE CONJURING brought about old school scares with aesthetics that recall such classics as THE EXORCIST, POLTERGEIST, and an obvious spiritual connection, THE AMITYVILLE HORROR. James Wan’s film, based on the real-life account of a pair of paranormal investigators (Ed and Lorraine Warren played by Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga), releases today just in time for Halloween on a 2 disc Blu ray edition (DVD + UltraViolet), and a single disc DVD.

Special Features: 3 featurettes (“A Life in Demonology,” “THE CONJURING: Face-To-Face With Terror,” and something called “Scaring the ‘@$*%’ Out of You”) equaling around 30 minutes.

One of my favorite films of the year, Richard Linklater’s BEFORE MIDNIGHT, the third film in the ongoing series about the talky relationship between Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy, also comes out today on home video in single disc Blu ray and DVD editions. Read my review, which contains info about the film’s Special Features, here.

A film that definitely won’t make my top ten of favorites, Shawn Levy’s THE INTERNSHIP (my review), the comedy that had Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson goofin’ on Google, is our this week in a 2 disc Blu ray Combo Pack, and a single disc DVD edition. Special Features include Theatrical and Unrated versions of the film, deleted scenes, a mocumentary about the Quidditch Match: “Any Given Monday,” and commentary with Director Levy.

The writing duo from THE DESCENDANTS, Nat Faxon and Jim Rash, scored box office success with their directorial debut THE WAY, WAY BACK, as I saw by week after week of appreciative audiences last summer at the indie theater I work at part-time. I wasn’t particularly impressed with the film – it’s a pretty routine kid-comes-of-age-while-on-a-family-trip-to-the-beach scenario, but its decent cast including Steve Carrell, Allison Janey, Toni Collette, Sam Rockwell, and Maya Rudolf keep it somewhat afloat. Bonus material includes deleted scenes and several behind-the-scenes featurettes.

Another comedy that doesn’t quite cut it that’s out today on Blu ray and DVD is Dan Mazer’s I GIVE IT A YEAR. The British rom com is about a couple, Rafe Spall and Rose Byrne, who get married only to find they’re in love with other people in the form of Anna Farris and Simon Baker. Being that first time director Mazer co-wrote BORAT and BRUNO, there’s a lot of crude humor epitomized by how Spall puts the premise in one of the film’s making-of featurettes in the Special Features:

“In all relationships, you get together with someone, you spend the first four months of the relationship stifling farts. Then they get married and let it rip. And they realize that they don’t like the smell of each other’s farts.”

For those who happen to like this film’s farts, there’s also a blooper reel, deleted/extended scenes, outtakes (of one wacky scene involving doves) and multiple interviews with cast/crew.

Nicholas Winding Rehn and Ryan Gosling’s crime thriller follow-up to DRIVE, ONLY GOD FORGIVES also drops in single disc Blu ray/DVD editions today. Special features include a commentary with Director Rehn, 12 short behind-the-scenes segments, “The Music of ONLY GOD FORGIVES with Cliff Martinez, and over 10 minutes of interviews with Rehn.

Also out today: Max Mayer’s comedy drama AS COOL AS I AM (starring Claire Danes, Sarah Bolger, and James Marsden), Rachid Bouchareb’s JUST LIKE A WOMAN (2012), Roel Reiné’s action fantasy DEAD IN TOMBSTONE (for those who can’t get enough Danny Trejo), Verena Paravel’s 2012 documentary LEVIATHAN, and Lavinia Currier’s 2011 drama OKA!



On the older films out today front, there’s the Bruce Lee: The Legacy Edition (4 Blu ray/7 DVD), The Vincent Price Collection, Michael Findlay and Horacio Fredriksson's 1976 thriller SNUFF, and the Criterion Collection Edition of Lewis Allen’s 1944 horror classic THE UNINVITED, starring Ray Milland.

TV series sets out this week include Nikita: The Complete Third Season, Call The Midwife: Seasons 1 & 2, The Young Riders: Season 2, and Silk Stalkings Complete Seasons 6, 7, & 8.

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Sly & Ahnold's Buddy-Convict Flick ESCAPE PLAN Is A B-Movie Blast

Now playing at a multiplex near you:

ESCAPE PLAN (Dir. Mikael Håfström, 2013)

There’s just no way Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger can make a movie together that isn’t a throwback to their ‘80s action heyday. It's simply impossible.



Of course, THE EXPENDABLES movies have been there and done that (and will again), but this shiny formulaic prison break movie, a buddy-convict flick if you will, proves that maxim all over again.

The graying former rivals (they never would’ve appeared in each others’ movies during the Reagan era) here play fellow inmates in a secret state of the art maximum security facility that highly resembles the futuristic prison in John Woo’s FACE/OFF – you know, the ‘90s over-the-top action film in which John Travolta and Nicholas Cage traded faces? Yeah, I thought you’d remember.

Anyway, Stallone plays a “secure structure expert,” who is employed by various contractors to break out of prisons to test the strength of their security. The CIA hires him to go undercover to their new high-tech super prison to find the flaws in their system, but his methods are immediately compromised by a truck full of thugs who abduct him and remove the G.P.S. tracker embedded in his arm.

This leaves his staff including Amy Ryan (The Wire, The Office), and Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson scrambling to find his location, while his boss (Vincent D’Onofrio) seems less concerned, obviously because he was involved in the set-up.

Jim Caviezel (PASSION OF THE CHRIST, Person Of Interest), as the sinister as can be Warden, knows Stallone’s real identity (he even uses Stallone’s book on building an escape-proof prison as a reference guide), and has evil plans to use Stallone and Schwarzenegger to find the whereabouts of a never seen terrorist mastermind named Manheim.

If that last paragraph seemed a bit hard to follow, it really doesn’t matter as its just mysterious background fodder to the main action dealing with escaping from the prison which turns out to be located inside an oil tanker somewhere in the middle of the ocean. See what I mean about the prison’s similarity to FACE/OFF?

In the midst of these convolutions, Schwarzenegger has the best lines, like “You hit like a vegetarian,” while Stallone does his stoical man in deep thought thing, and there is juicy turn by Vinne Jones as a sadistic guard. A not so juicy turn is put in by the odd casting of Sam Neill as a prison doctor who so seems like he’d rather be anywhere else.

ESCAPE PLAN is smarter than THE EXPENDABLES movies, but it's still really stupid. However, hardcore fans who’ve been waiting for the duo of the Italian Stallion and Ahnold to break away from the EXPENDABLES ensemble of aging action stars and do a true buddy film where they kick a lot of ass together will surely find it to be explosively entertaining.

As someone who’s not particularly a big fan of either heavy weight, but has come to appreciate their brands over the years, I found it to be a B-movie blast. It has the look, feel, and gusto of Stallone and Schwazenegger’s greatest guilty pleasures – consider it LOCK UP meets COMMANDO. No self-deprecating jokes about being aging relics this time around, just good ole '80s-style action 101.

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