I love my Film Critic pants; I enjoy putting them on. There, they are on, and here we go! It's time for some capsule (short) movie reviews of four New Releases for the week of Friday, November 15, 2024.
1) A REAL PAIN
Starring, written, and directed by Jesse Eisenberg, this exceptional comedy/drama about mismatched cousins (Eisenberg and a stellar Kieran Culkin) who reunite for a tour through Poland to honor their beloved grandmother is one of the best and biggest surprises of the year.
It is at once a lovely, respectful, and beautifully shot tour around Poland that will entice anyone with a pulse to plan a trip there very soon. It is also a funny, poignant portrait of people with damaged pasts trying to overcome difficulties and live happy lives.
It is a work of uncommon compassion that director Eisenberg has filled with pain, honesty, raw emotion, and huge laughs. His sharp script and outstanding direction of the actors add to the genuinely effective drama and uncomfortable humor to create an exceptional movie.
This is Eisenberg's second film as a director, and it is a giant step up from his underwhelming previous film, "When You Finish Saving the World." It is an announcement of a real humanist writer/director in the vein of James L. Brooks or Cameron Crowe. In other words, he's got the goods.
Eisenberg, who is also terrific in the film, has gathered together some excellent actors to play the guide and members of the tour that the cousins are participating in. Will Sharpe (so good in "White Lotus") is fabulous as the harried tour guide; Daniel Oreskes & Liza Sadovy are excellent as the married couple just looking to have a good time; Kurt Egyiawan as a recent Jewish convert who has lived through some atrocities is outstanding; and it is absolutely spectacular to Jennifer Grey back on the big screen with a nice juicy role as a recent divorcee.
But this movie belongs to Kieran Culkin, who gives one of the year's best performances as the charming, funny, vulgar, outspoken cousin with a truly tragic backstory. Culkin finds such a nimble balance between the anxious comedy and the meditative drama that it is a wonder to behold and a joy to witness. He pulls you in emotionally and sells every single moment with exceptional poise and straightforwardness, which is uncommon in films like this.
Listen, he's gonna win an Oscar for this movie, and he deserves it, and "A Real Pain" is one of the year's best movies. - ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
2) BIRD
Director Andrea Arnold has made a few noteworthy films that mainly focus on working-class people dealing with everyday struggles but with a strange, often melodramatic flair.
Her most interesting film, "American Honey," was a pretty big stylistic swing that sometimes missed but was carried by a real sense of sincerity and some terrific performances.
Her latest, "Bird," covers that same kind of territory but with decidedly messier results that stem from a lackluster script, the casting of a truly annoying actor in the title role, and more than a passing and unfortunate resemblance to Dainna O. Pusic' "Tuesday" starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus, which is not only a much better movie than this one, but it is also one of the year's very best films.
The movie centers on the world of a lonely, self-sufficient 12-year-old girl (Nykiya Adams) who lives in squalor with her father (Barry Keoghan), who is about to get married, and her older brother (Jason Buda), who is a criminal involved in vigilante gangs.
Her world changes when she meets a strange man named Bird (Franz Rogowski, the truly annoying actor I was referring to in the earlier paragraph), starts a friendship with him, and discovers that there is more to this man than meets the eye.
The film then takes off into the metaphysical and surreal, with pompously symbolic shots of birds, insects, and various natural elements to offset the script's stereotypes and attempt to add meaning to what is a pretty simplistic story that's been done a million times.
What's real and unreal is left to the viewer's imagination as the story unveils more secrets and revelations that mostly fall flat, which is too bad because the more realistic elements of the film actually work.
Adams is quite good in the lead role, and the supporting cast all do their best with the uneven material, especially Keoghan, who continues to do some fine, daring work wasted in recent movies, like the awful "Saltburn," which has just not been worthy of his talents at all. "Bird" fits into that category perfectly.
The biggest hurdle for me, though, is Franz Rogowski, a German actor who I find to be incredibly mannered, forced, and almost unbearably pompous. He has worked with some well-respected filmmakers like Michael Haneke, Christian Petzold, and even Terrence Malick, but I just can't see past this guy's irritating process and self-congratulatory style.
Rogowski's performance in this movie, although not as irritating and damaging as his work in last year's "Passages," is simply bad, and it certainly doesn't help an already flawed film get any better.
On the limited technical side, the film is top-notch with beautiful 16mm cinematography, authentic production design and costumes, and nice location work, but it all seems like a waste. I would just watch "Tuesday" if I were you. - ⭐️⭐️
This new feature-length documentary about one of the most beloved actors in the history of cinema is yet another solid example of filmmaking from director Kathryn Ferguson, whose 2022 movie about Sinead O'Connor, "Nothing Compares," is one of the best music documentaries of the past 10 years.
Ferguson worked closely with Humphrey Bogart's estate and his son Stephen (who is an executive producer and story contributor here) to put together a thorough, interesting, and, at times, revelatory piece about the legend's life.
Through incredible clips, rarely-seen archival interviews and home movies, and decently presented re-enactments, the film covers his early life, his time in the Navy, his experiences on Broadway, and his eventual success, which led to his becoming the biggest male star in the world.
In addition to all of that, it covers his battles with the House Un-American Activities Committee, his dealings with old-time Hollywood, and, in the most detail, his relationships with the women in his life, including his domineering mother and the four wives he was married to.
Of course, the most interesting and compelling of those relationships was the one he had with the incomparable Lauren Bacall, who was the true love of his life and the mother of Stephen. Stephen also shares his stories about their relationship.
Although some of this material has been covered in other TV specials and documentaries, there is a real sense of discovery and joy in every frame of this film that even hardcore Bogey fans will find irresistible. - ⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2
4) RED ONE
In the latest Marvelization-of-cinema-that-passes-for-a-movie entry, some bad guys kidnap Santa Claus from the North Pole, and an E.L.F. (Extremely Large and Formidable) operative has to team up with the world's most accomplished tracker to find St. Nick and save Christmas.
Yeah, that old story.
Dwayne Johnson, Chris Evans, J.K. Simmons, Lucy Liu, Bonnie Hunt, Nick Kroll, and others star in this holiday action/comedy from director Jake Kasdan and the same team that brought you "Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle" and "Jumanaji: The Next Level." So, if that's your jam, good for you. I hope you love this movie because I most certainly did not.
This is as cynical, generic, and idiotic as Hollywood movies get. It is a loud, obnoxious assault on the senses that exists only to numb the paying customers into thinking that they are watching something of substance when, in fact, they are being ripped off.
The forced "Christmas Spirit" jammed into this tired action retread is as charming as hearing Mariah Carey in September or seeing a group of drunken bros in Santa hats vomiting on your subway car.
Everything about this tripe is annoying, as it desperately tries to become some sort of "Holiday classic" that will inevitably end up broadcasting on one of the FX Networks at 3 a.m. on a Tuesday during some sad future holiday cycle.
The cast clearly just took a paycheck with this one, and during most of the special effects-laden, uninspired nonsense they are forced to endure, they look noticeably bored - especially Evans and Simmons, who act like they have lost a bet and are being forced to appear in the thing.
I am a huge fan of The Rock, and his periodic appearances and in-ring performances with the WWE are still stellar and fantastic. But, as a movie star, he continues to reliably disappoint me as he stars in interchangeable dreck like this, and those "Jumanji" things, "Black Adam," "Jungle Cruise," "Rampage," "Baywatch" or any number of movies with "Fast," "Furious," or "Fate" in the title. He was so much more interesting as a pro-wrestler and has never lived up to the promise he showed in "Southland Tales." I can smell what he is cooking... and it stinks.
To be fair, some people might enjoy this thing and find it to be a much-needed diversion from what's happening in the real world, but it did the opposite for me. Except for some neat-looking CGI character work, one or two amusing quips, and a slightly charming performance by Hunt, this movie made me genuinely depressed. - ⭐️1/2
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