Week of February 11 to February 17

What’s on at the Tropic
by Phil Mann

Another movie with Academy Award props opens this week, RABBIT HOLE. The title is an Alice in Wonderland allusion to what happens when you suddenly pass from one world to another. But in this case the passage is the profoundly tragic one of a couple that is thrust from the bright happiness of a suburban existence as parents of a four-year-old, into a bewildering gloom when their son is suddenly killed. No one is at fault; he ran into the street chasing his dog. The event is eight months in the past, so the couple has had time grieve, but the wound is still fresh.

Director John Cameron Mitchell, best known for his brash, sexually charged movies Shortbus and Hedwig and the Angry Inch faced a new challenge when he took up the emotionally fraught theme of the death of child. Great movies have surmounted it: Ordinary People, In the Bedroom, Sophie’s Choice. So has Mr. Mitchell, with the help of David Lindsay-Abaire, who adapted his successful Broadway play, and the parent couple of Nicole Kidman and Aaron Eckard, especially Kidman with an Oscar and Golden Globe nominated performance.

The movie is not easy viewing, but it’s less a downer than a chance observe something we’d rather not experience first-hand. As critics note, “Rabbit Hole is entertaining and surprisingly amusing, under the circumstances” (Roger Ebert); “"Grief may be the topic under examination, but humor -- incisive, observant and warm -- is the tool with which it's dissected in Rabbit Hole." (Variety).

The strong performance of the Tropic’s other award nominees continues, so THE KING’S SPEECH, TRUE GRIT, BLUE VALENTINE and INSIDE JOB are held over for another week. I urge you to catch the ones you’ve missed. It’s especially interesting to compare Michelle Williams performance in Blue Valentine with that of Nicole Kidman in Rabbit Hole, both instances of Best Female Actor nominations in movies with tough themes.

On Wednesday evening, the Tropic’s Opera in Cinema series presents something different, not a stage production but a version of the classic RIGOLETTO filmed at locations around the city of Mantua by Marco Bellocchio (writer-director of the Mussolini biopic Vincere). With Placido Domingo as Rigoletto and Zubin Mehta conducting the opera, this will be a star-studded event.

The Monday night classic series is continuing its sold-out run with John Sayles BROTHER FROM ANOTHER PLANET. Joe Morton, the “brother”, is an alien man of color who crash lands in New York while escaping from evil bounty hunters (two “Men in Black” played by John Sayles and David Strathairn). He looks normal, has some supernatural powers, but lacks the power of speech. His adventures in Harlem, and the reactions of others, make this Sayles’ most creative, and most comic social satire.

Full info and schedules at TropicCinema.com or save yourself some keystrokes with TCKW.info
Comments, please, to pmann99@gmail.com.

Rabbit Hole (Brockway)

Tropic Sprockets by Ian Brockway

Rabbit Hole

When the camera opens on "Rabbit Hole",  the main character Becca (Nicole Kidman)  fusses with her garden. She seems like a grown up and anxious Alice- in- Wonderland, frantically plugging holes left by the White Rabbit. 

She is often fretting in her garden, as it is a refuge in grief from the loss of her son who died in a car accident. It has been eight months since his death. She is highstrung and manic while her automaton neighbors invite her out to dinner. Becca invariably declines.

The husband Howie (Aaron Eckhart) spends hours staring into the static of his computer screen or watching videos of his lost son on his iPhone. Howie's face is a mask of Status Quo as he moves soldier-like from one appointment to the next. As a couple they barely have any alone time. They go through the motions of joining a child loss support group, yet the members  are devoid of personality. Becca upsets the group by refusing to think of a dead child as God's "little angel". She detests religion. She withdraws more and more going so far as removing her son's clothes and drawings, driven to move on.

Her mother (Dianne Wiest) wears a crucifix and is a staunch believer. There is a touch of Minnie Castevet about her. Cloying sweet with a serrated edge. 

Indeed, around the upscale house everything is forced perfection: The dinners, the squash games, the picnics. Polanski can almost be seen smirking behind the newly painted off-white door.

Becca begins to wander like Alice herself. She becomes obsessed with the teenaged Jason (Miles Teller) who drove the car that tragically killed her son. Becca follows Jason  on the bus and along library aisles. She is surrounded and shut- in by reminders of toddlers and childbirth. The apprehension is as gripping as any De Palma film or Hitchcockian fugue. And during a botched open house, the dead son's room matches the haunt and mystery of "The Sixth Sense" even without the sight of spirits.

"Rabbit Hole" is based on the play of the same name by David Lindsay-Abaire and directed by John Cameron Mitchell who is known for pushing buttons ever since Hedwig and the Angry Inch" (2001). 

Never has domestic trauma seemed so melancholy or so sustained by quantum mechanics or the hyper-driving influence of Edward Albee.

Write to Ian at redtv_2005@yahoo.com

Rabbit Hole (Rhoades)

“Rabbit Hole” Swallows You Up
Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Pass the Prozac. I’m kinda depressed after seeing “Blue Valentine,” the quirky story of a deteriorating marriage, and “Inside Job,” the documentary about our crumpling financial system. And now we get “Rabbit Hole.”

No, not a sequel to Alice and the Mad Hatter, “Rabbit Hole” is a drama about a couple dealing with the death of a child.

Psychologists say there’s nothing worse than a parent outliving their child. Well, almost nothing.
“Rabbit Hole” is currently wrenching audiences’ emotions at the Tropic Cinema.

Here we see Nicole Kidman and Aaron Eckhart as a couple facing this crisis. As the more distraught of the two, Kidman gets to emote in a range that hovers between an understated “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe?” and an emotional “Revolutionary Road.”

When young Danny is hit by a car, Becca (Kidman) and Howie (Eckhart) are devastated. But they react in differing ways. While Becca tries to navigate the surreal landscape at the bottom of the rabbit hole she’s fallen into, seeking the solace of well-meaning friends, Howie dwells in his memories of the past while turning to outsiders. Emotions take another twist as Becca befriends the young comic book artist (Miles Teller) who was driving the car that changed everyone’s life so drastically.

Based on David Lindsay-Abaire’s play of the same name, Kidman obviously knows a meaty role when she sees one. She produced this indie film through her own company, Blossom Films. As a result, she has been nominated as Best Actress in the upcoming 83rd Academy Awards.

The film premiered at the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival, where it received a standing ovation. Kidman was also in the running for a Golden Globe as Best Actress – Drama, a SAG Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role, a Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress, and an Independent Spirit Award for Best Female Lead, among many others.

You have to applaud actresses who take chances. Especially, those who dive into dark emotional waters. Kidman has two adopted children (now grown) with her ex, Tom Cruise. And she has two children by current hubby, country singer Keith Urban. So you can imagine that these are murky depths for a mother to explore.

And for audiences. So fortify your emotions and go see it. Prozac Nation, unite!

srhoades@aol.com
[from Solares Hill]

Inside Job (Brockway)

Tropic sprockets by Ian Brockway 
Inside Job

"Inside Job" is an expose detailing the economic meltdown of 2008 when the banks were deregulated.  The film begins in Iceland. Iceland  is portrayed as an utopia of sorts. There is a high standard of living, unemployment is low and the landscape is environmentally sound. The small houses are so quaint you might think that this might be another Stieg Larsson mystery. But no, this is a true tale. The banks invaded. Big loans were given. The environment was compromised and then people lost their jobs. Iceland went bankrupt.

Then the film goes to America. To New York City. Wall street. Predatory lending. What follows is a virus of greed. An H1N1 of the economy. It is a sequence of dominoes falling. As the screen shows towering skyscrapers posed like claustrophobic  monoliths, the song "Big Time" is played as Wall Street executives sometimes hmm and haw and stumble, but mostly stick up for themselves and for their bonuses. The executives interviewed stall the questions and evade questions with such constancy that "Inside Job" at times seems like a "Saturday Night Live" political parody. The arrogance is so unabashed.

At one point an exec says, "I realize foolishly now that I have given you my time. You have three minutes and your time is almost up. So give me your best shot!" He snarls at the interviewer. His face is red with anger. 

Through the film, we learn that banks were in the process of deregulation through the Reagan, Clinton, Bush and even so far, with the Obama administration. According to the film, greed is non-partisan. The virus of wanting more and more and more is an indiscriminate disease. Bill Clinton hired an exec in favor of deregulation, Larry Summers,  and Obama has followed. Oh woe to any devout partisan!
My favorite part of the film is the brief questioning of a New York call girl, a Ms. Davis, who said she personally went out with many Wall Street men from Lehman Brothers to Goldman Sachs on down. According to her, she has seen members from every firm. She is sparkling and glossed in hot pink. This could be a bit from John Waters' "A Dirty Shame". I wonder if Charlie Sheen is a day trader on the side? 
 Mme Lagarde, Minister of Economic Affairs, is interviewed in a room with what appears to be gold leaf furniture and she seems sincerely concerned by the Economic crisis. But the choice in decor seems also a bit John Watery, under the circumstances. There is truth in humor.

Also mentioned in the film is the carnivorous fact that some of the subprime mortgages went to those who could not speak English and were targeted. With not a thought to whether they could make a payment. 

At the end of the film foreclosure notices litter Florida lawns like post-it notes. And Matt Damon, gives a solemn call to change as The Statue of Liberty fills the screen with her green solidity. Her impassive face challenges the camera, and all of us beyond the screen.

Write to Ian at redtv_2005@yahoo.com

Week of February 4 to February 10

What’s on at the Tropic
by Phil Mann


Two more Academy Award nominees open this week.

On the main Carper theater screen, there’s BLUE VALENTINE, the much talked-about story of a disintegrating marriage. Ryan Gosling (who just finished his Tropic run in All Good Things) is the guy and Michelle Williams (Brokeback Mountain, Shutter Island) is the girl. It’s her nomination for Best Actress that gives the movie its Oscar chops.

Director Derek Cianfrance worked on developing the movie for twelve years; Williams has been involved for six, and Gosling for four. Yet it wasn’t completely scripted, leaving the actors free to improvise their emotions and actions in critical scenes. We see them at different stages, when they’re young and adorable and in love, when they’re struggling with money and the reality of life, and when they fail to regenerate that early love in a sordid motel. The result is “an intimate, gorgeous and wrenching portrait of a working-class marriage” (Salon.com),  “brutal, compassionate, beautiful in its ugliness and one of the bravest films of the year” (NY Observer), “a work so beautifully acted and emotionally honest it is my choice for best movie of the year” (NY Daily News). This is independent film at its best, shot on a budget of only $1 million, a labor of love for all the principals. A must see.

In The George theater, there’s INSIDE JOB the “sleek, briskly paced …. meticulous and infuriating documentary about the causes and consequences of the financial crisis of 2008” (New York Times) that’s in the running for Best Documentary. It’s not the simplest subject, but director Charles Ferguson carefully blends talking heads with illuminating footage to make a “furiously interesting and hugely infuriating” (Wall St. Journal) exposition of the financial depression that lingers on.

Beyond that, three of this year’s Best Picture nominees continue their runs – THE KING’S SPEECH, THE FIGHTER, and TRUE GRIT – and the week is packed with Special Events.

Friday and Saturday nights mark the debut of the Tropic’s Late Night live events. Multi-talented performer Tom Judson brings his one-man show CANNED HAM  to town. It’s an insider 's musical that recounts the true life adventures of Judson, an established actor off and on Broadway, who, at age 43, became the gay porn star "Gus Mattox." He composed music for films and television (including Metropolitan, MTV and even Sesame Street) and performed in road companies of Cabaret and 42^nd Street before falling on hard times, and then hitting his stride again with his new show. Judson is a hunk, for sure, but he’s a charmer and a talented musician, too. Accompanying himself on the accordion, he describes such things as what it's really like on the set of a porn movie. Expect graphic language and adult themes, but comedy, not nudity.

Monday night brings the opening of the February Classic Soul Cinema curated by Lori Reid. Spencer Tracy, Sidney Poitier and Katherine Hepburn star in the classic about interracial marriage, GUESS WHO’S COMING TO DINNER.  This timely film was released in the same year (1967) that the Supreme Court struck down state anti-miscegenation laws in the aptly titled Loving vs. Virginia. Life imitates art.

Midweek brings high culture to the theater. On Tuesday it’s the Vivaldi ballet CALIGULA, via satellite from the Paris Opera Ballet. The live performance is at 1:30pm EST (7:30pm in Paris), with an encore showing at 7:00pm EST. And on Wednesday, it’s Shakespeare’s ROMEO AND JULIET in high def from the Globe Theatre in London. Filmed before a live audience in this reconstruction of the original Elizabethan arena, the camera makes you part of the action. Two performances, at 2:00pm and 7:00pm. [Please note that there will be no shows of Inside Job on Tuesday or Wednesday.]

Full schedules and info at TropicCinema.com or, to save some typing TCKW.info.
Comments, please, to pmann99@gmail.com

Blue Valentine (Rhoades)

"Blue Valentine” Is Not Really a Love Letter

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Elvis sang about a Blue Christmas, but director Derek Cianfrance wants to give us a Blue Valentine.

“Blue Valentine” is an oddball love story starring oddball actors Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams. Ryan was seen dating a life-size plastic doll in the quirky film “Lars and the Real Girl.” Michelle was looking for her lost dog in “Wendy and Lucy.” Both performers seem to be more comfortable in indie productions than Hollywood big-budget extravaganzas.

“Blue Valentine” is currently reaching local indie fans at the Tropic Cinema.

This Valentine’s card offers a look at a lackadaisical guy and a down-to-earth nurse who wind up getting married despite their differences. The film follows their marriage over the years, contrasting her ambitions with his stay-at-home comfort zone. Wife and kid are all he needs to make him happy. She wants more.

Pay attention. The storyline jumps back and forth in time, from courtship to marriage and back again. A way of helping us determine when and why the marriage started to unravel. Ryan’s goofy persona is spotlighted when he plays the ukulele and convinces her to tap dance on the sidewalk. Her grumpy discontent is obvious when father and daughter wake her up from a nap to share their childlike glee.

Despite an intense sex scene, the film only has an R rating. The Weinstein Company flexed its muscles and successfully appealed the original PG-17 without having to make any cuts.

At its heart “Blue Valentine” is a poignant character study. Slow paced and longish, it’s a bit of a downer for those seeking Cupid’s romance.

Gosling and Williams first met in real-life on the set of “The United States of Leland” where she played his girlfriend’s sister. Now, many independent films later, they come together again, this time as a mismatched couple.

Have they fallen prey to typecasting, at least as to the kind of roles they gravitate toward? Maybe.

Williams did her turn at teen romance on TV’s “Dawson’s Creek,” but proved her acting mettle in “Brokeback Mountain” and “The Station Agent.”

Like her character in “Blue Valentine” she admits to having a hard time balancing the demands of her career and the “consuming duties of motherhood.” She has a child by the late Heath Ledger, her costar in “Brokeback Mountain.”

She says the loss of Ledger and the bleakness of some of her roles have “taken a toll.”

However, things are beginning to look up for Michelle Williams, having received an Academy Awards nomination as Best Actress for her outstanding performance in “Blue Valentine.”

Ryan Gosling – who started out as a kid on TV’s “The Mickey Mouse Show” – offered his fans strong heartthrob appeal in “The Notebook.” But he chooses to stake his claim on indie films, delivering masterful performances as the coke-addicted teacher in “Half Nelson” or the off-center killer in “All Good Things.”

Like the character he plays in “Blue Valentine,” Gosling comes from a working class background. Most of his male relatives still toil in Canadian paper mills, he says. Pointing out that “acting’s a little easier.”

His performance in “Blue Valentine” was passed over for an Oscar nomination, but he doesn’t seem to care. He’s not one for mainstream whoopla.

What does he look for in an indie film role? “Really, it’s simple – just somebody I think is a real person,” he says.

As for “Blue Valentine,” it fills the bill. “The theme for me is love and the lack of it,” Gosling explains. “We all want that and we don’t know how to get it, and everything we do is some kind of attempt to capture it for ourselves.”

srhoades@aol.com
[from Solares Hill]

Inside Job (Rhoades)

“Inside Job” Is Must-See Doc

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Despite the pronouncement that we’ve survived The Great Recession, many of us still feel its financial impact. But how did it happen? What went wrong with America’s financial safeguards? Who’s to blame?

Filmmaker Charles Ferguson (“No End in Sight”) has the answer. Or at least his documentary “Inside Job” purports to. The doc’s title gives you a hint of the designated villains – the financial community itself.

Billed as “the first film to expose the shocking truth behind the economic crisis of 2008,” it delivers on that promise with dozens of interviews (Paul Volcker, George Soros, Barney Frank, Scott Talbott, Elliot Spitzer, Nouriel Roubini, Charles Morris, and others), as well as plenty of hard-edged research and startling facts.

The global meltdown had a negative impact that exceeded $29 trillion dollars. People lost their jobs, their homes, their life savings.

Narrated by Matt Damon, “Inside Job” is currently telling all at the Tropic Cinema.

Charles Ferguson points his cinematic finger at a “rogue industry,” where greed and deregulation have corrupted the financial community, politicians, and even academia.

More straightforward than a Michael Moore documentary, “Inside Job” contains too many facts to be dismissed as the latest conspiracy theory. As the old saw goes, “Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you.” Or your money.

My informal movie poll says it’s a documentary that will make moviegoers’ blood boil. Particularly if they check the near-empty contents of their wallet.

One viewer said “Inside Job” explains the financial crisis “in as close to layman’s terms as you’ll ever get.”

Another irate viewer reacted with, “I want to hire a barista to cold cock a former Lehman Brothers exec who retired at 42. Put down your plastic forks. Pick up your pitchforks. And follow me! We’re marching on Washington, er, Wall Street. Same thing.”

The Nation described it as “the movie of the decade,” then added, “unfortunately.”

 Unfortunately, indeed.

“Inside Job” has been nominated for an Academy Award as Best Documentary. But you should see it for its message.

Too bad there’s not a ceremony to hand out prison sentences to those who so blatantly failed our financial systems.

srhoades@aol.com

[from Solares Hill]