Greenberg: Grade C

C

Greenberg (2009)
Ben Stiller, Greta Gerwig, Rhys Ifans. Co-writer and director Noah Baumbach.

Stiller is newly arrived in LA from a New York mental institution to housesit for his brother. He develops a relationship with a younger household assistant (Gerwig). She is passive and a dim bulb, so she more or less accepts Stiller’s hyper-neurotic obsessions and they form a friendly, sexually bumbling relationship that lacks the interpersonal intimacy that neither of them is capable of. And that’s it. Nothing happens of any consequence and there is no character development.

The strength of the film is the compelling dialog and extremely good acting, especially by Stiller. He really is a good dramatic actor, even though his part is still nominally comic in this story. Gerwig is a good actor but her character is so bland that she can’t do much. Ifans, as an old friend of Stiller’s is a standout. There are some subtle but not very funny jokes about LA, about dogs, about age anxiety, and so on. The script is extremely authentic, not clichéd, but clever as it is, it only concerns banalities. Nothing of import or interest is actually said. There is no story and no ending, so the movie just meanders pointlessly on. I didn’t get bored though because of the strong acting and sharp dialog, and it is worth seeing for those features, but I have to say this is a slow moving film.

The music direction and sound engineering are intrusive and destructive, with featureless tunes slowly cranked up in volume until you have to hit the mute button to protect your brain. There’s no point to that. It is not even dramatic music. It’s just noise for the sake of noise, maybe in a desperate attempt to introduce some excitement into an otherwise flat picture.

American History X: Grade A

A

American History X (1998)

Edward Norton, Edward Furlong, Stacy Keach, Elliot Gould. Director Tony Kaye.

This gem of a movie had slipped by me so I was glad I picked it up from Netflix, which is strong on backlist. Norton, one of the finest actors working today, plays a Crypto-Nazi racist in Los Angeles. But unlike most racist baboons, his character is intelligent and can articulate extremely well the fear, helplessness, and xenophobia that underlie racism. Actually there are a couple of speeches where his mouth is so full of words that we lose the sense of character. That is the writer’s fault, not his.

Intelligent and intuitive though he is, he is nevertheless a violent scumbag, and ends up serving three years in prison for killing two black guys (pretty light sentence, actually). While in the joint (where he is informed that “he is the nigger here”), his high-school aged brother (Furlong), who worships him, drifts ever deeper into the local Nazi movement, led by Keach.

After prison, Norton has a more mature, tolerant attitude. We see his transformation in beautiful black and white flashback scenes that tell a wonderful substory. He is dismayed by his young brother’s extreme attitudes and is rejected by his old crowd, which has become even more violent and crazy than before.

Directing and the script too, are extremely clunky in the first half hour, so much so that I thought the film would be unwatchable, but it is worth sticking with it because it all smoothes out. They must have had a second crew create the beginning as a separate project, because its quality is really out of line with the rest.

The film’s message is overtly preachy (“racism is bad”), and the story is only just barely believable because it does not address the facts that these skinhead types are very uneducated and living way outside of society’s economic and social structures. It takes more than “a change in attitude” to correct those problems. Still, Norton’s character's development is plausible, and his acting alone is worth the price of admission.

Shrink: Grade C

C
Shrink (2009)

Kevin Spacey, Keke Palmer, Mark Webber; Director Jonas Pate.

Spacey is an L.A. psychiatrist to celebrities, but he is suffering from depression, possible alcoholism, and, it seems, drug addiction, although we only see him smoking marijuana, which does not make you depressed, and we only see him drinking occasional wine and beer, so the addiction story is not convincing. His real problem is that he is grieving over the recent suicide of his wife, although we do not see him go through much actual grieving. Mainly he just stares into space as if depressed, and makes angry, sarcastic remarks to everyone, which is not consistent with depression. So it is not clear what is up with him except he is burned out on life in a monumentally self-centered way.

One of his clients is a high school student (Palmer) who is also grieving, over her mother’s suicide. We never learn much about that situation, but over the course of the movie, each character yields enough self-defensive anger to become sort-of friends in a way reminiscent of Good Will Hunting. (Actually, Robin Williams appears as an alcoholic patient in an uncredited role, and Spacey’s dope dealer looks like Matt Damon – probably not accidents).

There is no story really, it is just various characters adrift, confused by life, searching for something. In the end, everybody conveniently finds some kind of salvation to wrap it up on a relatively happy note. Without a story and without believable characters, there is really nothing going on in this movie, but Spacey is always a joy to watch, and Keke Palmer is extremely interesting. I wanted to see a lot more of her character, and a lot less of the other deadbeat characters.

Photography has some noticeably good moments but sets and scenes are nondescript or clichéd. Music is appallingly bad, designed to evoke sentimental feelings, but had me reaching for the mute button. Directing is obtrusively trite. The script is terrible. No therapist could survive a week in business with the skills of Spacey’s character. So all you have left is some enjoyable acting, especially by Spacey and Palmer.

The Informers: Grade C

C
The Informers (2009)
Billy Bob Thornton, Kim Basinger, Wynona Ryder, Mickey Rourke, Rhys Ifans; Director Gregor Jordan.

Four stories are about life in LA during the early ‘80s, that is, life of the rich and irresponsible, or criminal and irresponsible. The stories are intercut so we follow all four at once, but they are only tangentially related. In all of them, uneducated, undeveloped, egocentric characters drift along without self-awareness -- not very interesting.

Ifans leads a punk/rock band. Band members are enormously wealthy, stay only in luxurious hotels, smoke weed, snort coke, and engage in continuous orgiastic sex with all manner of youth, both male and female. What a life. But they are mean-spirited, cynical, bored, and clueless.

Thornton is a wealthy music producer, separated from his wife (Basinger), who is some kind of neurotic recluse who occasionally sleeps with one of the band members. BBT is having an affair with a news announcer (Ryder), who remains in mannequin mode even when not on TV. The producer is a generic self-centered bastard/asshole but we find out late in the movie that he also shoots up drugs when Basinger loans him her syringe after they attempt a reconciliation.

Rourke (pre-Wrestler) is a criminal lowlife who kidnaps a boy to make some quick cash for his heroin habit. He and his drifter girlfriend share needles too. The kidnap payoff does not go well and he has to skip town in a hurry.

The briefest story is of a young man who might have been part of the Informers or just a groupie, who inexplicably accepts an invitation to go to Hawaii with his estranged father, a conventional dimwit square. Between them is icewater that remains even in Hawaii.

The “ending,” if it can be called that, is that one of the band’s promiscuous groupies develops Kaposi’s sarcoma, a pre-AIDS condition and lays dying on a California beach in her bikini. The message seems to be wistful: ah, for the good old days, when there was unlimited sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll, and nothing to worry about! AIDS was identified about 1980 and is not known to these characters. Therefore what? If only they had known about AIDS, they would have had a strong moral sense and been upright citizens? AIDS is their punishment for debauched lives? This movie doesn’t know what it is trying to say.

On the plus side I could watch Thornton, Basinger and Rourke all day. They’re great. Hard punk/rock music was beyond my taste. Otherwise, the scenes, the script, the directing, the cinematography are mechanical and cliché. Despite these serious shortcomings, the movie does give the sense of a rich, ignorant and aimless lifestyle that is interesting, and it does make you wonder how social life would have evolved without the AIDS epidemic.

The Soloist: Grade C

C
The Soloist (2009)
Jamie Foxx, Robert Downey, Jr., Catherine Keener; Director Joe Wright.

In this docudrama of a true story, Foxx is Ayers, a schizophrenic homeless man in contemporary Los Angeles. Downey is an LA Times reporter who does a story on Ayers’ skilled playing of a violin with only two strings. He befriends Ayers. In his research he discovers that Ayers was once a gifted cello player with the LA symphony before he succumbed to schizophrenia. The reporter provides Ayers with a new cello and takes him to a couple of classical concerts.

There is no plot beyond that. The man has schizophrenia, which means he hears voices, has delusional thinking and incoherent speech. The reporter is unable to get psychiatric medicine for Ayers, not that he would want it or take it. The movie is really a dramatization of the awful plight of the homeless in all big cities. Most are victims of drug abuse and/or mental illness and all are in financial ruin. They are abandoned by their families and friends, by the medical system and by all of society (except for a few dedicated but overwhelmed social service organizations). This movie demonstrates all that, and gives a fairly accurate portrayal of schizophrenia. I was pleased that Foxx’s character did not suddenly become “cured” in Hollywood melodramatic style, upon playing the cello again, or upon meeting his mother again, because schizophrenia is an incurable brain disorder. It can go into remission, and it can be managed, but there is no happy ending.

As a docudrama this film performs an educational service. Acting by Foxx and Downey is superior and well-worth seeing. But as a movie, it is a not very interesting or entertaining, and as a documentary, it is superficial. It takes two hours to give a 15 minute story on homelessness. Neither Ayers' nor the reporter's life is examined in meaningful detail. Schizophrenia and its treatment are not explored. Not even the tragedy of becoming afflicted is well dramatized. The camera swoops around dizzily as on a TV show, for no apparent purpose, although there are a few individual shots that prove a good photographic eye is behind the lens once in a while. The dialog is pedestrian. The characters do not develop over time. We never do understand the reporter’s motivation for getting involved. Catherine Keener is wasted in an incomprehensible character. The overall pace is far too slow. And, as mentioned, there is no plot. There are some interesting DVD extras on homelessness in LA, including interviews with the real life Ayers and the reporter, but these do not redeem the movie.

Undoing: Grade B

B
Undoing (2006)
Sung Kang, Kelly Hu, Russell Wong, Tom Bower; Writer-Director Chris Chan Lee.

This crime drama is set in Los Angeles’ Koreatown. Sam (Kang) returns after being on the lam for a year, to try to reestablish his life (although we don’t know what that was – drug dealer?). A year ago his best friend was shot to death in a drug deal gone bad. Why he feels guilty about this is unknown. His girlfriend has moved on in a year and rejects him at first, although she eventually comes over to him (although my wife said that character wouldn’t do that). Sam does a drug deal to get the girlfriend out of debt to her boss/suitor, but somebody, possibly at the order of a dirty cop, is trying to kill him, thinking he has the drugs or the money from the year-ago deal. It’s unclear if he does or not. The story is confusing but it limps darkly along. There isn’t anything particularly Korean about the project except some of the actors. The acting is good, especially by Kang and Bower, and the cinematography is stylish and thoughtful. The music is enjoyable and unintrusive. The characters do not develop and there isn’t much narrative drive, but the film is pleasant to look at, the actors are attractive, and there is just enough interest.