Quick takes on May December and other films

A new David Fincher film starring Michael Fassbender? Sign me up! This is an absolutely incredible movie about a professional assassin (we never hear his name) on a job in Paris. There’s no major dialogue for awhile, other than The Killer’s thoughts, which we are privy to. This guy is very good at his job, telling us that he can’t claim a 100% success rate because one target died of a heart attack before he could be killed. The build-up to this newest target is fantastic, full of tension and a real look inside the mind of our anti-hero. However, the job goes awry when someone steps in front of the target just as The Killer takes the shot. He goes on the run, returning to his home in the Dominican Republic, but there are ramifications for not being successful at this level. He gets home to find his girlfriend has already been attacked and tortured; she has survived, but only through luck, and is in rough shape. Now The Killer is on a mission to hunt those who hired him, and who tried to clean up his mess. There’s some middling reviews online about this movie from fans expecting more of an action thriller, but that’s not what this movie is supposed to be (though there is one really incredible fight scene in the second half). The movie all about the psyche of a killer, his routines and mindset, and what happens when he deviates from that to protect the person he loves. I was enraptured from the very opening scenes, the total quiet that The Killer works in, with nothing but his thoughts. By the end, I was repeating the mantra that he regularly says to keep himself focused. Amazing film. ★★★★½

Nyad, on the other hand, lacks any kind of excitement or emotion, despite being a based-on-a-true-story film about an inspirational person. Diana Nyad was a world famous marathon swimmer in the 70s, swimming around Manhattan and from the Bahamas to Florida, but her goal of swimming from Cuba to the USA always eluded her. In 2010 and now in her 60s, she gets the urge to try it again. In the film she makes several attempts at doing so, until finally accomplishing the task in 2013. The swims themselves are fairly exciting, but what kills this movie is the absolutely awful, robotic dialogue, which never once sounds natural. Even a subplot regarding Diana overcoming childhood drama failed to move me. And don’t blame the actors (Annette Penning as Diana and Jodie Foster as her friend and coach Bonnie). All I can point the finger at is the directors and screenwriter, who don’t seem up to the task. I’m not always a fan of biopics as they can often be very dry, and this is one of those. I did stick it out to the end of the film, only because I wasn’t familiar enough the Diana’s story to know how it ended, but if I had, I probably would not have made it all the way through. ★

Every now and then a movie comes along with an absolutely standout performance by an actor, even when the movie itself doesn’t come together right. That’s the case for Reptile, a police procedural thriller starring Benicio del Toro. He plays a detective named Tom, who is assigned to a case where a woman was murdered in an empty house she was selling. The police have a couple minor leads but nothing great, so everyone is a suspect at first. There’s the woman’s husband Will (Justin Timberlake), her estranged husband Sam, and a stalker named Eli. The more Tom digs, the more questions come up. The movie starts great, with intense music that really adds to the intense feeling, but after awhile, I started to feel like the film was just spinnings its wheels. It really got to a point where the story was more convoluted that it needed to be, with the plot throwing everything against the wall to see what stuck. There’s even a couple amateurish “gotcha” moments. The one glue holding it all together though is del Toro, who is as good as he’s ever been. If anyone should get Oscar buzz despite not being in a very good movie, this is it. My rating is based on the movie itself, but I highly recommend seeing it just his performance alone, you won’t find better. ★★★

Rebel Moon Part One: A Child of Fire is a film as unwieldy as its name. It’s no surprise that the idea for this movie began as a pitch from director Zack Snyder to Lucasfilm, as it looks very much like how Snyder would do Star Wars, and borrows heavily from it. The film begins on a remote planet at a peaceful farming village, where a woman, Kora, came 2 years ago as a refugee and has found a home. She was fleeing something, but what, we do not exactly know. Her peace comes to and when the Imperium, the war mongering rulers of the galaxy, come seeking information on rebels in the area, and threaten the village harm if they do not supply food to the soldiers. With a promise to back for grain soon, they leave a small contingent and depart. Kora will not watch the Imperium destroy her new friends and family, so she kills the soldiers and sets out to find like-minded people to help her protect the village, in a Seven Samurai/Magnificent Seven style. Her path takes her around the galaxy, recruiting a handful of powerful people who have a grudge against the Imperium, setting up a big battle in the end. The movie has style, but unfortunately that’s about all it has, and too often, Zack Snyder is doing his Zack Snyder-y thing with the constant slow motion action scenes. It grows old quick. The movie is lifeless, with a boring plot, which is exactly what you don’t want in a movie about revolution. Snyder has grand plans to produce an entire Star Wars-like franchise out of this, but he better produce a better sequel or it will be the shortest franchise in the history of film. A couple stars because it is pretty, but really not worth your time. ★★

May December is one of those films with a very uncomfortable subject, so while it will creep you out more times than you’d care for, it does feature outstanding performances by its 3 mains. From acclaimed director Todd Haynes, May December follows an actress named Elizabeth (Natalie Portman) who is in Savannah to interview the real-life person she’ll be portraying in her next movie. The subject of the film is the story of Gracie (Julianne Moore), who, 24 years ago, was arrested and sent to prison for seducing and marrying a 13-year-old boy. The boy, Joe (Charles Melton), married Gracie once he was old enough, and they went on to have kids and a life together. It very much looks like Elizabeth is a method actor, as she is basically becoming Gracie as the film progresses. She interviews everyone around town: Gracie’s ex-husband, her estranged kids from her first husband, her lawyer; basically anyone who has a Gracie story to tell. And Elizabeth gets conflicting views: Gracie is either an emotionally abusive power-hungry narcissist or a lonely, sad, victim of abuse herself. The film is a little on-the-nose sometimes, but the characters drive the story, and each is fantastic. Elizabeth will do anything to “become” Gracie, Joe is a man who never emotionally grew past that of a 13 year old and truly had his, not only childhood, but whole life stolen from him, and then there’s Gracie. Who is either the most vile or the most complicated person in the movie. If the plot sounds familiar, it is loosely based on a true story from the early 90s. ★★★★