August: Osage County

Back in the summer, August: Osage County was one of my most anticipated movies of the second half of 2013.  With an extremely deep cast, and being based on a Pulitzer Prize winning play (the screenplay was written by Tracy Letts, the writer of the play) it really felt like it had a great deal of potential to really provide a deep and interesting story.  The movie is about a very dysfunctional family, led by the pill-popping, cruel matriarch Violet (Meryl Streep) who is left alone when her husband disappears, an event that leads to her daughters, Barbara (Julia Roberts), Karen (Juliette Lewis), and Ivy (Julianne Nicholson) to come around her and support her.  Well, ‘support’ may not be the best word to use, because, as I had mentioned, it is a very dysfunctional family and their idea of ‘support’ may be different that yours or mine.

Holding the film together are some wonderful acting performances, especially by Streep and Roberts who play characters who are far from likable.  Violet is a very detestable person, and Streep seems to care not for her own personal vanity and creating relatable characters, as she just seems to allow herself to perfectly ruin any moment she may create where she becomes relatable.  Her performance in this film is another solid argument as to why she should be considered the best actor alive today.  The character of Barbara is one of the strongest of the siblings, and perhaps the one who has been most affected by the parenting flaws of Violet.  Roberts creates her own character, but at the same time it is one that mirrors, perhaps more subtly at times, Violet.

It would be hard not to as well mention the supporting cast, which all do so well to bring their characters to life.  One that stood out the most to me was Charles (Chris Cooper) who was married to Violet’s sister, Mattie Fae (Margo Martindale), and the de facto patriarch of the family.  He is able to become the keel of the ship that is the family and add an element of humanity and moral uprightness that is missing from so many people, and he does it in a warm, loving, and fatherly way.  Also standing out was Benedict Cumberbatch, who plays Little Charles (the son of Charles and Mattie Fae) who is a very sensitive dullard.  We have seen Cumberbatch play some very cerebral and powerful characters this year (such as Khan in Star Trek: Into Darkness, and the voice of Smaug in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug), and it is very interesting to see him in such a defenseless and powerless role, showing further his acting talents and what his young career has in store.

While the film was stoutly cast and showed the effects of family behaviour, it did end up suffering from some core issues that managed to hold its potential at bay.  The film had some great moments of comedy in it, and others of very sobering reality, however the lines and transitions between these often felt blurred.  While the story worked very well as a play, it is possible that the movie needed a different screenwriter to better adapt it to the different medium.  As I mentioned the blurry transitions, this is what kept the film from truly hitting home for me.  It seemed that the change in gears and pace could happen very quickly and abruptly, causing me to never settling into one mode for long enough before the next shift happened.

The execution and delivery really did appear to be the biggest hurdle for the movie, for while the story looked to show the emotional revelations, development, and even growth within the family, it continually seemed to fall just short of achieving the desired emotional impact.  It really was difficult to feel what I was supposed to during this film, and that became frustrating because I truly had a desire to be invested in the characters, but was never able to find that the moments where they were to be sympathetic ever fully resonated.

The movie lands in that grey area where there are a lot of reasons to recommend it, such as the casting, the acting, moments of drama and comedy, but there are equally enough reasons to not recommend it.  Being a person who relies mostly on logic and reasoning, I find that emotion is what is guiding my rating of this movie, or more accurately, the lack of emotion.  The film should have stirred up a great range of feelings within me, and ultimately seemed unable to achieve that, mostly due to a jagged progression.  As well, the characters could have stood to be more relatable for moments to allow us into their world of pain and emotionally stunted growth.

Rating – 2.5 out of 4 stars

Gigli

Tonight may be a bit of a crap storm, as my proof reader is out watching Gravity and I am incredibly tired.  Physically tired, to be exact.  I don't know what is worse sometimes, physically tired or mentally tired.  My current state is causing me to take multi-syllabic words and any phrases with coherence and mash it into grammatical feces, so it could be a bit of a mess to try and read through.  I will give it a once over afterwards, but I doubt that could help.

And when mush is the current state of the mind, why not turn to a movie that takes competent minds and turns them to mush.  Gigli is a self-described 'romantic comedy' starring Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez.  It came out in August of 2003, and was directed by Martin Brest.  It takes a lot of criticism for being an atrocious movie (6% on Rotten Tomatoes), and seems to have permanently marred the careers of all involved.

I don't want to sound like someone who jumps on the bandwagon and bashes this film.  I also wish I could say that saltines are the essence of succulence.  But I can't.  As saltines are dusty and dry, this movie is painful.  Shove too many saltines in your mouth and your ability to consume is temporarily shut down, and watch too many consecutive minutes of Gigli and logic and reason begin to wane.

The movie is about a supposed criminal named Gigli (rhymes with really) played by Ben Affleck, and Jennifer Lopez, another supposed criminal.  It is a movie about what supposed criminals do as part of their successful criminal activities, working for supposed compotent criminal employers, pulling off supposed well thought out and well planned kidnapping schemes, all the while allowing for some supposed comedy and supposed chemistry.

If that paragraph did not make sense, that's alright because even though the movie's basic plot does make sense while watching it, it still leaves one scratching their heads.  I could go into all the details of the brilliant kidnapping scheme (where Gigli walks into a group home, walks out with his mentally disabled target, takes him to an apartment with large windows on which he never shuts his blinds, allows all strangers and police officers who knock on the door to enter, goes through no efforts to keep his victim from using the phone, and lets his victim sleep on the couch - which is pretty darn close to the door - while he sleeps in the next room with the door closed, and while the police are scouring the city for him, takes him for rides in a convertible).  Blargh, I am growing stupider.

If you want to witness the breakdown of Scott, the individual, then just probe him with questions about Gigli.  It will, inevitably, bring him to his breaking point.  Half an hour into the movie I leaped off the bed, ranted with my appendages flailing madly, and then was compelled to send an angry email.  This movie taps into the rage that lurks in us all, and can drive us to utter insanity.

There is no one big problem with this film.  Everything is really the problem.  I did find that Martin Brest's vision of what a mentally disabled person is to be very saddening.  Justin Bartha, who played the kidnapped Brian, did such a base level portrayal that was completely insulting.  It was the kind of character that feeds into stereotypes and sets back popular understanding of this group of people many years.

Of all the acting, there were two bright moments in the film.  One was from a cameo by Christopher Walken (who played a police officer investigating the kidnapping, but who seemed to never bother to find a description of the suspect), and Al Pacino (a criminal who you dare not cross).  Both actors gave very interesting performances and seemed to have fun with what they were doing.  Ultimately, their appearances were of absolutely no consequence whatsoever.  Any work they did to bring tension into the plot was destroyed minutes later when they are forgotten.

The rest of the acting was plenty plain.  I don't really blame Lopez and Affleck, as what they were working with was just not good.  Lopez, in particular, was given three extended scenes of dialogue that I must believe were meant to be cerebral, sensual, or cunning.  In each case the scenes fell flat, because those sort of scenes were never in Jennifer Lopez's wheelhouse and should not have been forced on her.  Heck, even Meryl Streep would have had a hard time making those segments captivating.

Coming from a director with two Oscar nominations (both for Scent of a Woman) and a budget of $54 million, it was a bit of a disaster.  This makes me feel good in the sense that I am not alone in my pain.  It debuted at a miserable 8th place in the box office (it lost to Spy Kids 3D) and made only $3.7 million.  After all its time in theatres, across the entire surface of the planet, it only made $7.266 million.  This movie ruined the career of Martin Brest (literally... he has done nothing since and is hardly seen), and it ruined my night.

Don't let it ruin yours.

Rating - 0.5 out of 4 stars