Week of July 10-16 (Rhoades)

Tropic Overview

Tropic Cinema Offers Must-Sees and Wanna-Sees

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Film Critic, Cooke Communications

This week Tropic Cinema offers an interest film selection, a couple of must-sees and some wanna-sees.

If you haven’t seen “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl,” do. Yes, it’s about two teen outcasts who befriend a classmate dying of leukemia. It’s sad, it’s funny, it’s a must-see. Tulsa World calls it

“smart and funny and meaningful, the kind of movie that you may not be familiar with yet, but which you might watch many times in the years to come.” And Parade Magazine says, “Give into it, go with it and let it take you where it leads you -- and don't get caught up in thinking that you already know where that will be.”

You might describe “Dope” as “John Hughes for millennials.” Black kids in the hood have replaced Molly Ringwald in the Chicago suburbs. Here a smart kid named Malcolm (Shameik Moore) must figure out how to trade a dope dealer’s stash for a Harvard education. Cinelogue.com says, “This dope coming-of-age comedy is about dopes and dope dealers, but it's also a heartfelt and perceptive
examination of cultural trends with style and energy to spare.” And The Skinny opines: “A smart bag of references, to both modern meme culture and bygone music and movies, Dope is neither pastiche nor misty-eyed nostalgia.”

“Self/less” is a clever science fiction film, with Ben Kingley as a rich guy with cancer who does a body swap and winds up looking exactly like Ryan Reynolds. But being someone else is not as easy as he’d hope. Beliefnet says it has “some provocative concepts about life, death, memory, identity, and, well, karma.” And Tri-City Herald says, “Decent sci-fi if it's your thing and from Tarsem Singh who is one of my favorite directors and a very good storyteller.”

And if you just want to see something silly, there’s “Spy” with Melissa McCarthy as an inexperienced secret agent. Aside from the fat jokes, which she takes to the bank, this is one of McCarthy funnier outings. Chicago Readers notes, “Hollywood is gradually figuring out what to do with Melissa McCarthy.” And NOW Toronto concludes, “This is an awful lot of fun. Don't wait for the DVD; see it with a crowd.”

So which films here are you’re must-sees and which are your wanna-sees? No matter, with only four films you can see them all.

srhoades@aol.com

Dope (Rhoades)

Front Row at the Movies

“Dope” Is Really Dope

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Seems like only yesterday I used to see Lenny Kravitz and his then-wife Lisa Bonet in the elevator of a friend’s apartment building on Christopher Street in New York City. They usually had their infant daughter Zoë with them.

Now Zoë’s all grown up and one of the stars of “Dope,” a hot new indie film that’s playing at the Tropic Cinema.

Dope has many meanings here. The drug (know as “Lily” in this story). A dummy (the straight-A student caught up in a drug deal). And “excellent” or “cool” (which this film certainly is).

Here we have Malcolm (Shameik Moore), a smart kid who wants to go to Harvard, but his school counselor calls the idea arrogant. After all, Malcolm and his pals Jib and Diggy (Tony Revolori and Kiersey Clemons) live in The Bottoms, a down-and-out area of Inglewood, California.

They get invited to a drug dealer’s b’day party at a nightclub, a reward for talking a pretty girl named Nakia (a grown-up Zoë Kravitz) into attending the bash. But rival dopers shoot up the club, and Malcolm escapes with the dope unknowingly in his backpack.

How does he get the molly back to the dealers without getting shot? How does he avoid being seduced by Jaleel’s sexy sister Lily (Victoria’s Secret model Chanel Iman)? How does he convince Nakia that he’s not like all the other druggie guys? How can he trade the dope for an admissions to Harvard?

These are the challenges Malcolm faces in “Dope,” a subversive coming-of-age film from Rick Famuyiwa, a first generation American of immigrant Nigerian parents, who went to USC with intentions of becoming a lawyer and ended up in film school.

 “I made ‘Dope’ as an homage to the many amazing independent and studio films of the 1990s that rewrote the rules of mainstream entertainment.” He cites “Boogie Nights,” “Jackie Brown,” “Bottle Rocket,” “Menace 2 Society,” and “Kids.”

“I pretty much just tried to steal as much as I could from them,” Famuyiwa says.

What we really have here is a black John Hughes, shifting the teen comedy scene from wealthy Chicago suburbs to the hood. And his trick is getting us interested in these kids -- a clique of nerds devoted to ‘90s hip-hop music -- who are as far cry from Molly Ringwald and her friends as The Bottoms is from Harvard.

srhoades@aol.com

SPY (Brockway)

Tropic Sprockets by Ian Brockway

Spy

Director Paul Feig scores again with "Spy," a Melissa McCarthy vehicle, that is no doubt a comedy, but also stands up surprisingly well as an espionage thriller as well as a laugh riot.

Yes, here again is McCarthy as we know her: the sarcastic and brash lady with a big mouth, but her role has heart. She's a CIA logistics operator who longs for the glamorous jet set life of an agent on the field. As Susan Cooper, she pines for the love of her fellow agent Fine (Jude Law) but she is sequestered behind a desk and can only give him directional cues.

When a strait-laced agent Crocker (Allison Janney) needs a low profile, mundane agent to gather the location of a terrorist weapon, she immediately thinks of Cooper. Cooper immediately takes to far-flung locations to collect intelligence.

Thus begins a kind of odyssey involving agents, guns and briefcases. This genre has a rich cinematic history from "Fletch" and "Spies Like Us" to "Austin Powers," but what makes "Spy" different from the rest is that it does truly pull its weight as a thriller in the key of Bond.

The exchanges between McCarthy and Rose Byrne as a dominant villain are first rate. While Byrne may have the best lines in telling Cooper that she eats like a baby while dining at a five star restaurant, Cooper always gets the last word. Director Feig (Bridesmaids, The Heat) once again highlights this film with a strong female protagonist that will not, under any circumstances, give in.

Jason Statham makes good fun of himself as Agent Ford, a spy who takes himself overly seriously, though in reality he is a hopeless klutz. His character is not new, but his vigor and egotistical energy shows through and manages to make it a refresher course ala Monty Python.

But in terms of stealing the show, the honor goes to Bjorn Gustafsson as a clueless guard.

While we know McCarthy's comedic persona well, her hapless self deprecation and charisma in spite of all flashes though all recognizable shtick.

During the first half we get the usual jokes of Cooper being the under-appreciated misfit, but by the film's second hour, Susan Cooper is a woman of action, progressively subverting the Bond film to include all women, and also proving McCarthy as an action star.

The combat scene in the kitchen with numerous vegetables, breads and cutlery of all sorts, almost brings the film to high art. A singular note of lunacy.

At first glance, Jude Law might seem weak as a bit of a handsome dullard, lest we forget that he is acting as the straight man.

"Spy" is in the long tradition of mixed genre films that have featured Dan Aykroyd, Steve Martin, Chevy Chase, Richard Pryor, and Abbott & Costello. "Spy" is a welcome addition with dialogue that not only spoofs for laughs but also points to a future in going beyond the conventions of what audiences might expect.

Write Ian at ianfree1@yahoo.com

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl (Brockway)

Tropic Sprockets by Ian Brockway

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl

Friendships imperiled by sickness are the stuff of melodrama. Thankfully "Me and Earl and the Dying Girl" by director  Alfonso Gomez-Rejon (Tv's American Horror Story) manages to avoid any pitfalls of sap by giving some quirky charm and vibrance in its place.

Greg (Thomas Mann) is a melancholy high school student caring only for cinema. He pathologically avoids the intimacy of others spending most of his time with his friend Earl (Ronald Cyler II) watching Werner Herzog films in the office of the history teacher, Mr. McCarthy (Jon Bernthal)

Greg's domineering mom (Connie Britton) informs him that Rachel (Olivia Cooke), a fellow classmate, has leukemia urging him to spend time with her. Greg is resolutely opposed, thinking it would impair his energies as a creative loner, aside from acute anxiety.

Greg reluctantly agrees. So begins an unusual friendship between the two.

At the heart of this film is the wondrous chemistry between actors Cooke and Mann, who don't ham it up and have a generosity of spirit that is freely given.

For a start, Mann is terrific, drawing from the rich history of characters depicted in the films of John Hughes, right on par with "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" and "The Breakfast Club." Cooke is spirited and authentic, with a full range of emotion, not one of them being a withered sadness. This is no sob story, but a chronicle of a friendship, much of it with a light lift.

But that is not to say that it ignores darkness completely. More often than not, however, the film tells it like it is and then moves on.

The repartee between the two is destined to be classic, in parallel to Matthew Broderick's antics as a young kid.

This film has a texture and a color that actually feels like the psychic heart of a teenager. The camera is frequently tilted sideways in perspective, from up above or upside down. School cafeterias feel like prisons. A girl's room is a warm sanctuary filled with pillows, at once funny and erotic.

Within the whimsy of the camera angles is a profound pulse which illustrates the wildness of a teen: one part euphoria, one part comedic horror-show.

Interspersed with the ups and downs are some very funny jokes about classic cinema with most of the humor aimed at Herzog and Klaus Kinski.

Well known for comedy herself on "Saturday Night Live," Molly Shannon gives a spare and understated performance as Rachel's mother, who covers up her worry with a forced joie de vivre. Nick Offerman does fine too as Greg's father, though his character trades heavily on Offerman's past goofy parent incarnations.

Although it does flirt with the sentimental and the bittersweet, it is to its credit that it never slides fully into soupy emotion.

Above all, the film is a surprising portrait of friendship. Its glib self deprecating spirit is refreshing and without cynicism. "Me and Earl and the Dying Girl" delivers a type of "The Breakfast Club" to a new generation making an irrepressible crowd pleaser, garnished with jovial colors.

Write Ian at ianfree1@yahoo.com

Week of July 3 - 9 (Rhoades)

Front Row at the Movies

Six Tropic Films for Us and Them

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Film Critic, Cooke Communications

This week’s Tropic Cinema’s lineup seemingly follows the philosophy of two for us, one for them. Only this week it’s four indie films versus two mainstream movies -- six films in all. And let’s admit it, being movie lovers we’re both us and them.

First up is “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl,” a life-affirming tale of two teen filmmakers who befriend a classmate diagnosed with leukemia. Yes, a sad theme, but this wonky little film is far from

being a downer. Examiner calls it “an emotional, powerful, and well written drama with a strong message, incredible writing, and powerful performances.” And St. Louis Post-Dispatch proclaims it “a must-see -- and one of the best films of the year.”

Next up, “A Little Chaos” gives us a glimpse of the court of Louis XIV (actor/director Alan Rickman) where the landscaper (Matthias Schoenaerts) is falling for Sabine (Kate Winslet), the woman he hires to design a fountain at Versailles. Boston Herald says, “A 17th Century semi-historical romantic drama, the film has its pleasures. Winslet is lovely and resilient as its faux feminist heroine.” And Reeling Reviews calls it “a little fish in a big pond of summer blockbusters but it is a film worth seeing for its story, characters, especially Sabine, and period production.”

Then we have “I’ll See You in My Dreams,” a sweet film starring Blythe Danner as a widow who wants more out of life than playing cards with her friends -- so she hangs out with the pool guy, tries speed-dating, and falls for a wealthy suitor (Sam Elliott). But how is that working out? Detroit News sees it as “a touching, funny and thoughtful film that trades in honesty rather than artifice.” Creative Loafing calls it “a confident feature angel-kissed with an enviable cast.” And Illinois Times says, “Danner delights.”

“Escobar: Paradise Lost” features Benicio Del Toro as a Colombian drug lord whose daughter is seeing a young American surfer. A dangerous match. Reel Talk Movie Reviews says, “In the role of Pablo Escobar, Benicio Del Toro exudes menace.” And Washington Post observes, “The suspense … in the film's final hour is genuine, and the action gripping.

Balancing off this quartet of indie films is “Spy,” a wacky comedy about a lowly CIA analyst (Melissa McCarthy) who goes undercover with two top agents (Jude Law and Jason Statham) to avert a global disaster. Movie Talk terms it “a rib-tickling espionage spoof that gives a confident female-centered spin to the traditionally ultra-masculine spy movie genre.” And Spectrum calls it “the year’s best comedy so far.”

The other big mainstream film is “Mad Max: Glory Road,” director George Miller’s return to a dystopian future where ISIS-like tribes are chasing Max (Tom Hardy in this new version) across the wasteland as he assists a woman (Charlize Theron) in rescuing a truckload of runaway brides. Seattle Weekly calls it “masterfully kinetic and often downright berserk.” And Spliced Personality tells us, “You stumble out of the theatre giddy about what films can do, transported by the breathtaking velocity in this battering ram of a picture that just goes, goes, goes and then keeps on going.”

All in all, four indies for us and two mainstream movies for … us too!

srhoades@aol.com

New York Film Critics Series: Boulevard (Rhoades)

Front Row at the Movies

NYFCS Shows Robin Williams’ More Somber Side

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Notable as Robin Williams’ final film, “Boulevard” is getting a one-night advance screening this coming Tuesday night at the Tropic Cinema, the latest entry in the New York Film Critics Series.

Williams died last year, a suicide following a long bout of depression. But this film was already in the can.

One of America’s most popular comedians -- kind of a Jonathan Winters clone, to name his mentor -- he made the transition to serious actor.

I met Williams back in the ‘80s. He was a motor-mouth comic on speed dial, his spot-on impressions shifting every few seconds. He was unbelievably manic … and unbelievably funny.

However, as an actor he often took on serious roles. Aside from the self-impersonation he did in “Good Morning, Vietnam,” he had a hidden a dark side -- revealed in films like “One Hour Photo,” “Seize the Day,” “Dead Poets Society,” “Insomnia,” and “The Angriest Man in Brooklyn.” He won an Oscar for playing a subdued shrink in “Good Will Hunting.”

Sure, he did the zany stuff too -- “Flubber,” the genie in “Aladdin,” a penguin in the “Happy Feet” movies, Teddy Roosevelt in those “Night at the Museum” movies, even “The Crazy Ones” on TV.

But like Pagliacci, Williams remained the archetypical “sad clown.”

“Eighty percent of comedians come from a place of tragedy,” noted Time Magazine when writing about Williams’ death.

“Boulevard” does little to dispel Robin Williams’ somber side. In it, he’s an older man trapped in a marriage of convenience, hiding a secret. As a weary banker, his life comes unglued when on an aimless drive down an unfamiliar street he meets a troubled young man named Leo (Roberto Aguire), forcing him to come to terms with who he really is.

Recent research by Oxford University suggests “the creative elements needed to produce humor are strikingly similar to those characterizing the cognitive style of people with psychosis -- both schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.” It concluded, “Comedians may use their act as a form of self-medication.”

Maybe “Boulevard” shows us Robin Williams was off his meds.

srhoades@aol.com

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl (Rhoades)

Front Row at the Movies

“Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” Celebrates Life

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Cancer is not necessarily a death sentence. But it sure isn’t good news. So how do you handle it when you befriend someone who has just been diagnosed with leukemia?

 Well, you could make a movie.

In “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl,” that’s what Greg and his best friend Earl decide to do when Rachel comes into their lives.

The two Pittsburgh highschoolers are film buffs who entertain themselves by making low-budget movies in their spare time, often parodies of classic films. Take “400 Bros.,” for example.

So when Greg (Thomas Mann) and Earl (Ronald J. Cryler II) meet Rachel (Olivia Cooke) whose life expectancy is limited, they decide to make a film for her.

Before you say this sounds like a downer, think again. “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” won both the US Grand Jury Prize for Dramatic and the Audience Award for US Drama at the Sundance Film Festival. Plus it got a standing ovation.

The film is both “darkly funny and realistically somber,” as one moviegoer put it.

Sure, all the expected high-school movie tropes are there -- from social cliques to teen angst. In addition to the trio in the title, we have Connie Britton and Nick Offerman as Greg’s awkward parents, Jon Bernthal as the archetypal cool teacher replete with tats, and Molly Shannon as Rachel’s wine-sipping mother. Even Hugh Jackman’s voice turns up on a talking Wolverine poster.

“Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” is currently celebrating life at the Tropic Cinema.

Will you like it? Depends.

An enthusiastic teenage moviegoer said, “Halfway through, I wanted to stand up and give it an ovation already. It is a brilliant film, made for those who grew up watching the cinema. I thought I was maybe delusional for thinking this could be one of my favorite films. Then, Variety said it would be a hallmark of my generation.”

Still another offered this succinct summation: “It was cool as beans.”

However, a more cynical film buff concluded, “It was better than a lot of movies targeted at teens but it’s probably not going to mean much to people older than 21.”

All of that aside, following the box-office success of “The Fault In Our Stars” -- the story of two cancer kids falling for each other -- you can count on this being a hit too. Die-hard fan of TFIOS may find it blasphemous for me to say this, but this quirky film is actually a superior cinematic experience. Kudos to director Alfonso Gomez-Rejon who up to now has cranked out silly TV shows. Good practice for this winning film debut about two guys and a dying girl.

srhoades@aol.com