The King's Speech vs. W./E.

                  A brief primer for anyone not familiar with the Abdication Crisis of Edward VIII of England:  When he succeeded his father George V as King of the British Empire in 1936 Edward was technically a bachelor, but had spent several years in the company of Wallis Simpson, an American socialite.  As their relationship advanced it became clear that Edward intended to marry Wallis, which was a huge no-go for the monarchy.  She was a foreigner and a commoner, she seemed to share Edward’s more modern views on how the monarchy should operate – namely by taking a public stance on political matters.  She was also once-divorced and technically still married to her second husband, which would make marrying her religiously tricky, since among his other duties Edward was also the Governor of the Church of England.  Rumors flew that she had a sexual dysfunction having something to do with her time spent in “Oriental brothels,” that she had been involved with men other than Edward during her separation from her husband, that she was a gold digger, and so forth.  After many discussions with Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin about his options, Edward decided to give up the throne to pursue his life with Simpson. 

                  Edward and Wallis did eventually marry, and spent much of their time shuttling back and forth from America to France and living off an allowance given to them by the monarchy, and some questionable sales of family real estate.  Never one known for his political savvy or subtlety, Edward made waves during WWII with some remarks that were deemed as sympathetic to the Nazi regime.  Though he and Wallis both denied that they supported Hitler, it was a black cloud over their already tarnished reputations for the rest of their lives.  From the 1950s on they lived mostly under the radar.

Edward & Wallis

                  Meanwhile, Edward’s younger brother Prince Albert became King George VI, a title he never expected nor wanted.  As a child he was often sickly, easily frightened and had a stammer that followed him into adulthood.  Prior to becoming King he had enjoyed a relatively peaceful and quiet life with his wife Elizabeth and two daughters.  Suddenly his family was thrust into the spotlight during a time of international turmoil and after a major royal scandal.  He wrote to Edward that he had taken over “a rocking throne” and tried “to make it steady again.”  Despite the decline of the imperial power of the United Kingdom and the hard years of the war, under his leadership and by his example the popularity of the monarchy was renewed.

George & Elizabeth

                  I know that The King’s Speech won a bunch of Academy Awards while W./E. was pretty universally panned by critics and was directed by Madonna.  I still think it’s worth seeing both of them.  They offer different points of view on the same story, and not only by which family member each movie focuses on; they’re also stylistically opposite one another.

As I said in my original mini-review, The King’s Speech is a big, warm, fluffy blanket of a movie.  Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush are delightful as Edward and his speech therapist, Lionel Logue.  There’s an undercurrent of desperation to both characters – Edward is about to announce his country’s involvement in a second World War and must lead with confidence, Lionel quietly yearns to prove his mettle as a therapist despite his lack of formal training.  HBC is kind of phoning it in but I love her so who cares.  It won’t make you think, it won’t surprise you, but it’s nice and lovely heart-warming and soft-focused and comforting.

          W./E. is a completely different ballgame.   The film goes back and forth between the stories of Wallis Simpson and Wally Winthrop, a ‘90s New Yorker fumbling through a troubled marriage who becomes increasingly obsessed with her namesake.  It’s really easy to screw up a movie that jumps between timelines and I thought it impressively done.  It’s slick and sexy, the music is excellent, the clothing is AMAZING, and the cinematography beautiful and cool – as in “blue-toned”, but also as in “hip.”  It features some fine performances by lesser-known actors like Abbie Cornish, Oscar Isaac, James D’Arcy and Andrea Riseborough.  Wallis and Edward’s potential Nazi sympathies are glossed over a bit too quickly, it’s melodramatic and overdone at times and the ending is a bit weird and hokey but I didn’t care.  It’s worth it for the dancing scenes alone.  Go in with low expectations and you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

 

Mini Reviews: 3/12/13

Planet of the Apes:  1968 American sci-fi movie directed by Franklin J. Schaffner and starring Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowall, Maurice Evans, Kim Hunter and Linda Harrison.  A crew of astronauts crash lands on a desolate planet after their 2006-year journey of exploration at near-light speed.  Something about time dilation?  Sure.  They set off through the treacherous terrain in search of food and water and come upon a group of primitive mute humans.  Suddenly the group is attacked by gorillas on horseback.  Yeah, turns out they’ve landed on a planet populated by apes with the intelligence of humans and humans with the intelligence of apes.  When Taylor (Heston) begins speaking to his simian captors, it throws the whole religious and scientific theory of the ape society out of whack and he’s deemed too dangerous to live.  I really didn’t think I would like it as much as I did.  Sure, it’s cheesy, but if you can look past the hokey ape costumes and the Shatner-level acting it’s surprisingly interesting and examines – in a campy, sci-fi way – issues still currently relevant:  animal rights, the role of science in a religious culture, etc.

First Position:  2011 documentary directed by Bess Kargman which follows six dancers preparing for the Youth American Grand Prix, an annual ballet competition that earns the winners dance scholarships at prestigious schools and positions at elite companies.  The dancers that Kargman profiles are diverse in experience, background and style:  the orphan from Sierra Leone, the studious young girl and her scrappy little brother, the pale boy ingénue, the Colombian teenager living alone in New York to follow his dreams despite his almost overwhelming homesickness.  It’s enchanting, not too frivolous but not too heavy, the dancing is beautiful, and the kids just seem so nice.

Three Days of the Condor:  1975 political thriller directed by Sydney Pollack and starring Robert Redford, Faye Dunaway, and Max von Sydow.  Joe Turner (Redford) is a CIA analyst who files a report on a spy novel after noticing some weird plot devices and the unusual languages it’s been translated into.  On the day he’s expecting feedback on the report, an assassin squad hits his office, and after his narrow escape he now feels he can’t trust his own government.  While on the run he takes a woman hostage and hides out in her apartment, eventually involving her in his search for the truth about the attempt on his life. 

                It was just okay.  First of all, Dunaway’s character is not at all believable.  Some rando takes you hostage, blathers on about spies out to kill him, compliments your photography, and then you have the most hysterical sex ever?  Which is essentially a montage of your depressing photographs interspersed with scenes of you appearing to have a conniption?  I appreciated the 1970s-Bourne-Identity thing going on, but the ending was anticlimactic.  Not wholly unsatisfying, but I probably wouldn’t watch it again.

The Hobbit – An Unexpected Journey:  2012 fantasy film directed by Peter Jackson and starring Martin Freeman, Ian McKellen, Andy Serkis, and Richard Armitage.  This is the first of a three-part film series based on the classic book by J.R.R. Tolkein.  Three parts.  Three.  The CGI-ness was way too much for me; there was a whole lotta time spent in the uncanny valley, guys.  But Freeman does a damn fine job as Bilbo Baggins, and despite my other quibbles with the movie and Mr. Jackson and the hype and the merchandising and the 3D-Imax-Cinerama-Cinemiracle-Cinemascope nonsense I OF COURSE will see all three movies.  And will enjoy them immensely.  I can’t help it.

Pitch Perfect: 2012 musical comedy directed by Jason Moore and starring Anna Kendrick, Rebel Wilson, Adam DeVine, and Skylar Astin (please don’t hold his name against him, he’s adorable and sings really well and I have a crush).  Beca just wants to move to L.A. and pursue a career in music, but her dad has convinced her to spend at least one year at college.  She reluctantly joins an a capella group that is desperately trying to stage a comeback after a disastrous competition performance the previous year.  It’s cute, it’s funny – oh, Ms. Wilson, how you do go on – it’s snarky and a little sharp at times, and of course there’s a lot of singing.  I really enjoyed it, but that might just be my inner choir geek talking.  I recommend it, but approach with caution unless you like musicals or singing-related television programs.

Men in Black 3:  2012 sci fi comedy directed by Barry Sonnenfeld and starring Will Smith, Tommy Lee Jones, Josh Brolin and Jemaine Clement.  The third and hopefully last of the MIB films, in which a dangerous alien escapes from a prison on the Moon, bent on returning to Earth and killing Agent K.

                Excrement.  I have a fondness for the first movie, and there were a few redeeming moments from the second, but this is really, really, really bad.

The Queen of Versailles:  2012 documentary directed by Lauren Greenfield, about the family of Jackie and David Siegel and their quest to build the largest and most expensive single-family house in the United States.  The film opens with the Siegel’s on top of the world:  construction is underway at their giant Versailles-replica mansion, their timeshare business is booming, David is bragging about being responsible for getting George W. Bush elected – in perhaps not an entirely legal way.  And then the crash of ’08 happens.  The economy tanks, suddenly no one wants to buy a timeshare anymore, and they’re forced to live on a much smaller budget.

                It’s fascinating, and for me perfectly captures the triumphs and tribulations of The One Percent during the recession.  They went from building a home with ten kitchens – that’s a kitchen per family member, kitchens for all! – to David suddenly freaking out about the electricity bill.  Jackie is suddenly faced with raising her children without a squad of nannies, flying commercial instead of on a private jet, and dealing with rental cars instead of a chauffeur.  She seems to spend money because she’s stressed or bored, which makes David angry, which makes her more stressed.  Meanwhile, their one remaining nanny is living in an old playhouse (which, okay, is still the size of a studio apartment) and sending every spare cent back to her family in the Philippines.  It’s really interesting, totally messed up, and I highly recommend it.

Mini Reviews: 3/2/13

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Hatfields & McCoys:  2012 History Channel miniseries starring Kevin Costner, Bill Paxton, Tom Berenger, Powers Boothe, Jena Malone and Mare Winningham.  It’s a fairly accurate portrayal of the bitter feud between two families living on the border of West Virginia and Kentucky after the Civil War.  You stole my pig!  You stole my land!  You knocked up my cousin and then ran off with my other cousin!  Seriously.

                  I was so excited when I first heard about this.  I mean, the lineup alone had me apoplectic and C’MON with that storyline!  Yeah.  I doff my hat to Mr. Costner for his general badassery.  But Paxton was not just chewing the scenery; he was gorging himself on cardboard trees.  That metaphor is a stretch, but you get my meaning.  Not even the rampant surliness of Powers Boothe and Tom Berenger could soothe me.  I got through one episode and called it quits.

                  Fun fact:  descendants of the Hatfield and McCoy clans actually went on Family Feud in 1979.  Weird.

Immortals:  2011 fantasy film directed by Tarsem Singh and starring Henry Cavill, Freida Pinto, Mickey Rourke and Stephen Dorff.  It’s loosely based on the Greek myths of Theseus and the Minotaur and the War of the Titans:  the mad mortal king Hyperion (Rourke) is on a quest to find a bow that will help him release the Titans from their eternal imprisonment, so he can use them in a fight against the gods.  First he has to track down a virgin oracle who knows the bow’s location, then he must deal with this rebel kid Theseus who of course is a son of Zeus because like half of Greece has gotten busy with the Father of the Gods.  Keep it in your tunic, dude.  Jeez.  Also Stephen Dorff is there.

                  Honestly, I kind of liked it.  I’m a big fan of Tarsem Singh and his over-the-top visuals (The Cell and The Fall), I like that Dorff’s still getting work, and I wasn’t totally put off by the departures from the actual myths.  It’s a pretty decent action movie.

Dial M for Murder:  1954 thriller directed by Alfred Hitchcock and starring Ray Milland, Grace Kelly, Robert Cummings and John Williams.  Tony’s wife Margot is having an affair, and he decides to have her killed, apparently hoping that his inheritance will comfort him.  But will he get away with it, or will his efforts be thwarted by her American lover and a fastidious London detective?  It’s really solid.  The acting is decent all around; Ray Milland is fantastic as the diabolical and charming Tony.  The pacing is nice, the twists and turns are believable, and the ending is tense right up to the final moment.

William Shatner’s Get a Life:  2012 self-congratulatory documentary directed by William Shatner, about the Star Trek convention phenomenon.  The interviews with the fans are pretty interesting, and often sweet and heartwarming.  When Shatner can bring himself to shut up, that is.  There’s a lot of supposed soul-searching on Shatner’s part, and it feels insincere and weird.  Skip it.  Unless you’re a Trekkie, in which case please don’t send me hate mail.

The Vanishing:  1993 thriller directed by George Sluizer and starring Jeff Bridges, Kiefer Sutherland, Sandra Bullock and Nancy Travis.  When Jeff’s girlfriend Diane disappears from a rest stop he sets out on an obsessive three-year quest to find out what happened to her.  I feel like I shouldn’t say anything else.  It’s a surprisingly good thriller.  It never drags, there’s a twist about two-thirds of the way through that I really didn’t see coming, and Jeff Bridges is mega creepy.  I highly recommend.

The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2:  The final Twilight movie with all the Twilight people based on all those Twilight books.  Shut up.  If you like the movies or books then you’ve probably already seen this or plan to.  It’s fluffy nonsense and sometimes I need that so quit judging me.  I very much enjoyed the giant Fuck You to the fans at the end.  Well done.

Lincoln:  2012 American historical film directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field, Gloria Reuben, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, David Strathairn, Tommy Lee Jones, Lee Pace, Hal Holbrook, James Spader, I could go on and on.  Unless you’ve been too busy preparing for the zombie apocalypse/Second Coming/Sequestration to pay any attention to pop culture, you already know this movie is about the passage of the 13^th Amendment.  Look, regardless of the criticisms that have been leveled against it, I stand firm in my opinion that this is an excellent movie.  The casting is outstanding.  Day-Lewis is a beacon unto my soul and I’ll tolerate no besmirching of his name.  Sure, it veers toward the melodramatic at times and it has that Spielbergian sheen to it . . . but what do you expect, it’s a Spielberg film.  I loved it.