October 2017 – Six Degrees of Film

Friday Flix

168816805 FOR 6 DEGREES COVER PHOTO SHOT — 6 Degrees of Film

Friday Flix: Welcome, film fans, to the last Friday in October. It’s traditionally the time when many of the best classic horror movies are shown on TV and debuted at the movies. The horror movies that have been touted as “classics” in so many cases in the articles collected in 6 Degrees magazine are simply not as powerful as many of the originals. The degrees are less than six that lead us to similarities, in many cases direct reboots and other films that pale next to the originals using some of the techniques borrowed from Hitchcock and other masters of the genre.
On TCM this weekend: We’ve featured a Repulsion Review in the magazine…The review finds a “Deeply disturbing psychological thriller…one of Roman Polanski’s most brilliant films.” Also on TCM: The Lost Weekend: An excerpt from the review: Popular Cinema has found drunkenness amusing. Only occasionally has Hollywood tried to wipe the indulgent smiles off the audience’s faces…” The Lost Weekend is the original “Portrait of a Drunk” which was re-worked for Nicolas Cage’s Oscar-winning film, Leaving Las Vegas.
Current Film Reviews are featured in 6 Degrees magazine of the original Blade Runner and the current The Florida Project. And about the Blade Runner remake, a look at the “The Tears of a Machine: The Humanity of Luv in Blade Runner 2049.” Also featured is in-depth look at the Colin Farrell/Nicole Kidman film The Killing of a Sacred Deer from Film Comment and Rogerebert.com; also reviewed: Thank You for your Service, the Miles Teller film.
After Weinstein: The Fall of Toxic Masculinity and the Rise of Feminine Consciousness is an article from Rogerebert.com that takes a look at the evolving scene not only in Hollywood, but nationwide as we continue to out some of the worst offenders.
Cinema in 67: Camelot Revisited talks about the beautifully made, but in some parts lacking musical version of Camelot with Vanessa Redgrave and Richard Harris. The theme of Camelot was one that was carried through not only in the metaphor presented in the tragedy of the Kennedy Assassination, but also the evolving culture of the sixties. This film was a kind of ode to a dying era.
Losers besides Weinstein: Geostorm could lose $100 Million dollars. An Understatement from 6 Degrees magazine: This has not been a great year at the movies for Hollywood…
Halloween Horror Movies: Featuring a questionable list of top grossing horror movies (Ghostbusters is not a horror movie!) The list includes Halloween; The Sixth Sense..(Not a Halloween pick!) and other likely suspects; The list is terrible from TheStreet.com. site. So…
Here’s A better list of Horror films: The Amityville Horror; Sleepy Hollow; Annabelle; Paranormal Activity; The Conjuring; The Blair Witch Project; Get Out; It; The Exorcist; And here’s some older “Classics” that fit the bill for classic horror: The Changeling; 13 Ghosts; Frankenstein; Halloween; Carnival of Souls (1962); The Haunting (1963); The Portrait of Dorian Gray; The Tingler (1959) and The Thriller Video with Michael Jackson and Vincent Price
Finally, Cosmopolitan has a list of some of the releases to watch for in 2018. This is an edited version of film picks that seem to range from fairly interesting looking to mildly entertaining!

Movies for 2018:

Black Panther: It’s a superhero film that actually looks a little different! Releases in February.

A Wrinkle in Time: From Disney and highly-anticipated, with Reese Witherspoon and Oprah! Opens in March.
Tomb Raider: Alicia Vikander in the remake of Angelina Jolie’s signature role. Debuts in March
Wes Anderson’s Isle of Dogs: Not too much information on this, other than the fact that it’s from quirky Indie director Wes Anderson. Opens in March
Overboard remake with Anna Faris: This one opens in April, and is a remake of the smallball comedy with Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell.
Avengers: Infinity War: Also: in April, another entry in the Marvel series.
A Star is Born: Bradley Cooper & Lady Gaga star in this remake of the Judy Garland hit (which was also remade with Barbra Streisand and Kurt Kristofferson in 1976) This one opens in May
Solo: A Star Wars Story: This film is a Prequel about Hans Solo’s life before he joined the Rebellion. Opens in May.
Ocean’s Eight: The Female Reboot with the obligatory “all-star” cast line up including Kate Blanchett, Rihanna, Sandra Bullock, Julia Roberts and Anne Hathaway. Opening in June.
Mamma Mia: Here we go again: July release set with some of the original cast and Cher joining the line-up for this, also a pre-quel.
Barbie Movie: An August release for this kids film starring Anne Hathaway as the world’s most famous doll.
Mary Poppins Returns: Set for December of 2018, Emily Blunt will star in this reboot.
Aquaman: Also set for December of 2018, Jason Momoa will star as the super-hero of the sea.

I notice in this batch not a lot of original thought went into these releases. They are all reboots or sequels/prequels to an existing series…Surprise! Surprise! There still may be an interesting list coming our way when we see the Indies and some of the smaller films that don’t get as much press. That’s always the way of things: good word of mouth and great storytelling wins the race every time. Until next week, see you at the movies!-ML

Friday Flix

Hello film fans! Welcome to Friday Flix. This week the films that debut are not the heavy hitters, many of those are coming out during the Holidays. But there are some good ones vying for the top box office spots.
In 6 Degrees Magazine, there’s a piece from Director David Fincher on Modern Cinema that’s worth a look. And the film reviews featured include reviews for Marshall, the courtroom drama surrounding one of Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall’s early civil-rights cases; and the LA Times gives The Florida Project with Willem Dafoe rave reviews: “probably the best movie you’ll see this year”….can’t get much better than that!
Blade Runner 2049 is reviewed in Movie Waffler. I reviewed it in 6 Degrees of Film and wasn’t impressed. For one thing, the movie was over-hyped. It wasn’t nearly as good as it was promoted as being, which was this game-changing thematic experience. In addition, it was overly long for the material that was explored.
It was reminiscent of the follow up sequel to Chinatown in several ways. Both revolve around a quest or a search that moves the action along, but in the case of The Two Jakes, Jack Nicholson was the big draw that the sequel used to carry the weight of a weaker plot. It’s hard to compete with classic films that introduce new and innovative techniques and original thought. Chinatown and Blade Runner were two such films.
Harrison Ford doesn’t carry this film. This film is almost exclusively Ryan Gosling’s vehicle, and he is not up to snuff. There isn’t one interesting element or nuance of character that is memorable in this version (The review is on 6 Degrees).
The film has been characterized as a dud or a bomb. It’s not terrible, but I can’t recommend it to see at the theatres. It’s for the small screen. There’s another article that makes the case that the soundtrack for Blade Runner 2049 is the star. I can’t agree with that either, especially in the wake of listening to the music of Vangelis and that masterly score for the original. Director Ridley Scott put so much attention to detail into the 1982 film, showing us a glimpse of a futuristic, yet dark and decidedly dystopian landscape that matched the theme from which the material sprang: the dark visions of writer Philip K Dick. This film just isn’t capable of continuing the thread needed to pull us into that same future void where we found ourselves at the end of BladeRunner.

There are lots of Oscar contenders opening in November. After seeing a trailer for the Benedict Cumberbatch film, The Current War, made by the Weinstein Group, I noticed they’ve pulled it from the schedule. It’s unfortunate that the politics must interfere with the artistic merit of a film, but that’s the way of the world. Weinstein has infected the conversation in Hollywood, as well as throughout the country. And women should be silent no more.
Some of the other films opening in November (see the Fall Newsletter link); are: Murder on the Orient Express & The Florida Project. The latter is about a six year old girl who lives with her mother in a motel in the Sunshine State. Willem Dafoe also stars in this Indie film, and as mentioned above, it’s been getting lots of good advance press.
There’s also a listing this week of actor Gary Oldman’s best performances (Oldman is starring as Churchill currently in Darkest Hour.) Can’t say that I agree with the list. Here’s mine: True Romance; Tinker,Tailor,Soldier,Spy. Harry Potter films; Child 44; Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are dead are some of Oldman’s best films, and I’d recommend any of those to fans who would like to see more of Gary Oldman in action.
There’s also an article about Films that may be contenders for Oscars including Dunkirk; The Post and The Shape of Water. Haven’t seen the latter two, but I would agree there is great interest and buzz with these films, particularly surrounding The Shape of Water.
That’s a wrap for this week. Stay tuned in coming weeks for the Holiday Films Newsletter and other 6 Degrees offers for you. Till then, hope you find some movies that you not just like but love, and see you at the movies!

Blade Runner 2049-Nothing to see here

Bladerunner 2049 17

The best place to start to review this film would be to recommend another viewing of Blade Runner, the vastly superior original from 1982. That film had the aura of a mystery. The Ridley Scott film had so many small details, the film noir elements as well as the sci-fi ones, that it kept you thinking and wondering as you watched it unfold. Ironically, at the time, it wasn’t considered a ‘hit’. Based on the Philip K Dick short story, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, the central question that permeated the film’s progression was the nature of what it means to be human.
It dealt with the issues surrounding what it means to have a soul, and how we know what the nature of our humanity is. It was a subtle message that was interspersed with a foreshadowing of doom and an apocalyptic pall that worked as a thread pulling us through each scene.
In this film, the dull and plodding nature of the plot line, where we find not an interesting protagonist, but a rather dull hero in Ryan Gosling, who is a pale stand-in for Harrison Ford, leaves us yearning for more in the end. The film clobbers the audience at times, hitting us over the head with the blare of the theme that is begging us to ask what it takes to be human, and what constitutes a soul.
The mystery of the film, the search for the mysterious child that is the central figure looming over the plot plods slowly along, It is a point that is neither cunning or strange. The story is one where we have an expectation of waiting for Godot, with the audience expecting something to happen, and the film always ends up holding back any type of cathartic release.
The villain, or villainess in this case, is about as interesting and predictable as a bowl of Kellogg’s Corn Flakes. She is much less interesting than the girlfriend of Ryan Gosling, who turns out to be a hologram, and the hologram is the only one who is multi-layered in this dull affair. And even that sub-plot is done with much more subtlety and charm in the superior “Her” which this film emulates in some manner.

The futuristic nature of the landscape, and the apocalyptic message for the audience is pretty much wasted in this version. Harrison Ford’s entrance, late in the action, is anti-climactic and even he looks bored and really past the point of even trying to make sense of the plot. There is little humor in this film, and although Gosling is competent in his execution, his character has strict limits as to how far you might want to go to be able to emote with the nature of the beast that is his straight-jacket of a role.
Robin Wright also looks slightly bored, as she valiantly tries to bring some interest to this slow moving affair. This film didn’t need to be almost three hours. It needed editing, as mentioned a few weeks back by a noted director who seemed to be itching to cut about one half hour or more from most of the feature films that boast the need to tell the story for almost three hours.
The story here is not a mystic tale or a fantasy romp, there is no CGI miracle or even a continuation of the Ridley Scott attention to detail which made the 80’s film so relevant and cutting-edge. The music was a large part of the allure in the original, and this one has almost no soundtrack other than a running commentary of rain and smoggy mist. In short, this one is only for die-hard Blade Runner devotees, of which I am one. No one is going to appreciate the origami figures, the memory implants, the futuristic ads and landscape of CGI unless they have specific memories of the superior version.

I would recommend waiting for the small screen to watch this film. It’s not unwatchable, and there are certainly good actors and a continuation of the themes that were explored in the original film. But there’s no need to rush to the theatres to see this film. And in some ways, that’s a shame. Bladerunner was worth the trip to see it on the big screen. If you get a chance, go see the original. Leave this one for home viewing.

6 Degrees: Friday Flix

168816805 FOR 6 DEGREES COVER PHOTO SHOT

Hello Film Fans! Some recommended reviews for the week include reviews from the Ebert.com site: Marshall; the film bio that is ostensibly about Thurgood Marshall, but is a courtroom drama from a particular time period in Marshall’s life in 1940’s America. One of the critiques I’ve heard raised is that the movie is good, but it’s not really a bio-pic of Marshall’s life. So there’s that…

Other film reviews on Ebert: The Mountain Between Us, which has received generally good reviews; Blade Runner 2049 is reviewed-my review is going to be published next week, and generally, I’ll just say that I would only recommend this film to those who are fans of the first film and sci-fi buffs. It runs a bit too long, but there are some other problems I’ve got with this one. The Ebert site didn’t really trash this film, and most critics seem to be kinder to this film than it probably warrants.

The Indie film, the Florida Project, with Willem Dafoe has generated lots of good buzz. It is reviewed favorably on the Ebert site as well. Also featured in 6 Degrees Magazine are a run-down of the best films of Willem Dafoe, as well as an article with the top Harrison Ford films. The Chicago International Film Festival is also featured on the Ebert site, along with an interview with the star of Marshall, Chadwick Boseman.

Finally, some of the classic films shown on Turner Classic this week are reviewed in 6 Degrees. Gaslight, which has become synonymous with the newly coined term, to “Gaslight’ someone, or to try and drive them insane…. The film from 1944 starred Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman as the wife who was “gaslighted.” Another film from TCM that is recommended if you have never seen it is Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore directed by Martin Scorsese and released in 1974. Ellen Burstyn won an Oscar for her lead in this great little gem of a film that really was a pioneering story centering around the trials of a woman who finds herself widowed and if follows her struggles for independence in a man’s world. This film, along with Judy Davis’ groundbreaking My Brilliant Career in 1979 really opened up the idea that women could carry a film about what it means to be an independent and single woman living in a world basically ordered by men!

Those are just a few of the recommended films for October. Lots of good films are opening soon, so stay tuned in the coming weeks for upcoming reviews in the magazine, including my reviews of Bladerunner 2049 and Victoria and Abdul. Till then, see you at the movies!-ML

6 Degrees: Friday Flix

Hello Film Fans! This week in 6 Degrees some of the best movies of the Season are starting to roll out. The Florida Project with Willam Dafoe has received great reviews, and Blade Runner 2049 has received ridiculously good reviews. I recall the first film didn’t get such a great reception at the time of its release. If you have never seen the original, please do so before seeing the new Bladerunner. There’s a review in 6 Degrees Magazine of the original film starring Harrison Ford.

Other movies out this week include The Mountain Between Us with Idris Elba and Kate Winslet and Una, with Rooney Mara, which is adapted from a stage play Blackbird.

Other projects of note include the Variety review of the documentary on Steven Spielberg. There’s a trailer for the new Woody Allen film Wonder Wheel with Kate Winslet. The children’s film My Little Pony is reviewed on SF Gate, which recommends the film “only for established fans” (5 and under, we presume!)

One interesting Oscars note: Foreign Language film submissions hit a record high this year, which is good and speaks well for the nature of the Global Village in which we live.

One of my newly discovered favorite film sites is awesomebmovies.com. This week, they have an interesting piece called The Modern Day Western vs The Classic Western Movie. It’s a very interesting concept, and considering that modern day westerns come few and far between, we need to grasp that the entire genre was one that dominated early Silent film and extended well into the fifties and sixties with Clint Eastwood being the last major star to draw huge crowds to see Westerns. There’s an argument that Star Wars films are a reboot of the Western theme, but for this piece, the original concept of Western films sticks to the films of the Old West.

Speaking of Westerns: If anyone would like to see a great Western that is rarely shown, set your box to record The Westerner on Turner Classic Movies this weekend with Gary Cooper and Walter Brennan. It’s one of Cooper’s great performances as the Western hero, a drifter named Cole Harden, and Brennan shines as Judge Roy Bean, the epitome of good and evil rolled into one in his character. There’s a great scene where Cooper casually lets the Judge know that he has a lock of hair from Bean’s goddess, Lillie Langtry, and the comic undertones are almost as good as classic Jack Benny. Catch it if you can!

Here’s the link to our Fall Film Newsletter, featuring all the films released in October. There are lots of good movies being released this fall, (in contrast to a slow summer), so hope you can get out there and catch a good flick this week. See you at the movies!-ML