29 October 2014

And the saint goes marching in...

“St. Vincent”     ★★★★

A Review by Kevin Powers


Sometimes you expect a little and get a lot. Rarely do I see a movie that fills me so fully with hope and joy and love. The debut feature from writer/director Theodore Melfi did that to me last Sunday afternoon. The movie is an all-out crowd pleaser starring the great Bill Murray in one of his best roles. “St. Vincent” is its name. Unexpectedly, it is my current favorite movie of the year.
            
Movies like “St. Vincent” set out to please the audience. The plot is obvious. You can see the end coming a mile away, but it’s a journey that is so well-made, so much fun, so touching, often heartbreaking, that we can’t fault it for that. It wants us to love it, so we do.
            
To know the title character, Vincent, or Vin (as they call him), is to…well, nobody really knows Vin. He lives alone in a broken down house in Brooklyn. He drinks way too much. He smokes. He gambles away whatever he gets.

The opening sequence of the film sets this up. We see his life, his routine. Get up, drink, smoke, drink more, feed his cat (which is all he has in the way of food), enjoy a visit from Daka, a great Naomi Watts as a pregnant Russian “lady of the night” complete with thick accent, pass out (violently), repeat. That’s about it.
           
Enter Maggie (Melissa McCarthy), his new next-door neighbor, and her son, Oliver (newcomer Jaeden Lieberher).  Maggie is going through a divorce and forced to work full-time (even over-time) to support the growing preteen. The father is suing for custody, so there’s that as well.
            
Oliver is small for his age, and, at his new private Catholic school, there, of course, is room for bullying. The normal name-calling and gym class taunts. His teacher (Chris O’Dowd) is that classic sarcastic, seen-it-all-before guy. He teaches them mostly about the saints.

18 October 2014

Boys and Their Wars

"Fury"     ★★★ 1/2

"The Maze Runner"     ★★

Two Reviews in One by Kevin Powers



Past, present, future…no matter. Throughout history, fictional or otherwise, and into imagined futures, young men are sent to fight, to kill, to sacrifice.

It is this idea that fuels what I believe we love most about war movies:  The youth of a land taking up arms in defense of freedom, rights, survival, life itself.  

Last weekend, I was able to catch not one, but two new movies that have this theme at their centers. And then there are also the girls. More on that later.

17 October 2014

On Home Video


by Kevin Powers


Remember the good ole days when you got in the car and went down to the local video store and searched and scoured the racks for upwards of an hour to find just the right movie you wanted? I miss that!

I was that guy with whom you hated to rent a movie. I was (and still am) picky. I've read the reviews. I know what's "good" and what's not. No. I don't want to rent that summer blockbuster or that silly, dime-a-dozen romantic comedy.

08 October 2014

Fincher's "Amazing" Streak Continues...

"Gone Girl"     ★★★★

A Review by Kevin Powers



In his latest masterpiece, David Fincher (2010’s “The Social Network”, 2011’s “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”), that maniacal mastermind of American noir, found himself working alongside author Gillian Flynn in adapting her 2012 novel, “Gone Girl”, for the movies. It is, before I go any further, one of best thrillers I’ve seen ever and one of the best movies of the year.

I will attempt to discuss this twisty, darkly comic tale of a marriage gone wrong lightly, without spoilers. To do otherwise would be a travesty.

Ben Affleck plays Nick Dunne, a Missouri bar-owner, who, on his fifth wedding anniversary, finds his wife, Amy (Rosamund Pike), missing with a suspicion of foul play. What ensues is a media circus straight out of the Nancy Grace playbook.

We learn of their relationship through flashback as the pages of Amy’s diary turn. We hear her voiceover. They were once madly in love New Yorkers (both magazine writers), kissing in sugar storms, living the high life. She, a wealthy city girl and model for a series of children’s books written by her parents. The “Amazing Amy” stories. He, a small-town boy making good in the big city. When they both lose their jobs to the recession and Nick’s mother falls ill with cancer, it is decided that they will move back to Missouri. The first step in their already crumbling relationship.

01 October 2014

Coming This Fall, Part III

by Kevin Powers


Last Monday, I celebrated my 30th birthday. My wife, Amanda, the greatest gift-giver of all time, made her usual point to just bombard me with BluRays. The theme: trilogies.

Everything, it seems, including yours truly, is better in multiples of three.

To cap off a perfect birthday, I got another great present, however. Late Monday night, Warner Bros. released the trailer for my most anticipated release this year. That is Paul Thomas Anderson’s (“Boogie Nights”, “Magnolia”, “There Will Be Blood”) adaptation of Thomas Pynchon’s darkly comic 2009 crime novel “Inherent Vice.”

If the movie itself is even close to as good as the trailer suggests, we are all in for a real oddball treat this December. Set to premiere this weekend at The New York Film Festival, the jury is still out as far as to just how good it really is. I am hopeful.