Kathryn Bigelow is back doing what she does best: delivering gripping dramas that keep you on the edge of your seat from start to finish. The director who gave us The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty is back with A House of Dynamite, and it wastes no time in getting the heart pounding. It starts as a seemingly normal day showing various spots around the globe, each of which deal with the USA’s response to threats: the Situation Room in the White House, a high tech radar station in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, a missile silo in Montana, the Pentagon, etc. At each, people are starting their days/shifts and it seems like any other, until the radar base picks up a ballistic missile launch from somewhere near southeast Asia. Initially, no one bats an eye, everyone supposing it is North Korea saber-rattling again, and that the missile will splash down in the Sea of Japan, as they always do. But after a few minutes go by, radar shows the missile isn’t sinking, it is going into a suborbital trajectory headed somewhere towards the continental states. Our countermeasures immediately go into effect, as time ticks down (just 19 minutes to impact from initial launch) and the missile’s ultimate target of Chicago is determined. The film is broken down into 3 segments, each showing roughly the same window of time (from before the launch right up to the moment before impact), and each section shows the time from the point of view of increasingly higher-ups in the government. The first is the grounds crew and Situation Room, who spot the missile and try to stop it, then from the generals and cabinet members who are providing advice and preparing counteroffensives, and finally from the President himself. As such, each segment builds in intensity right up to the end, and when the next section starts, you get to go through it all again. Great film, with a tremendous cast of who’s who, all delivering their A-game. And the scariest part of it all? It’s completely believable, making you think how close we are on any given day to complete annihilation. ★★★★★
Weapons is a (very) scary horror film that was a critics’ darling and for good reason. I generally don’t do scary movies, but several of my friends told me I had to see it, so I went in (with eyes half closed). The premise is scary enough: in a small suburban town one evening, 17 out of 18 children in a classroom go missing. Video door cameras saw them simply run out of their houses at the same time (2:17 AM) and none ever came back. The townsfolk, and especially the parents of the missing children, immediately turn on the classroom’s teacher, Justine (Julia Garner), calling her a witch and demanding answers. She has none, and starts trying to pin down the 1 child who did not disappear that night, Alex, but he refuses to answer her questions. While Justine is dealing with belligerent parents and obsessing over an ex-boyfriend (a local police officer, who will also play a big part before the film is done), one of the missing boys’ fathers, Archer (Josh Brolin), is starting his own investigation. As 30 days approaches since the kids went missing, Archer finds a few clues to where the kids may have headed that night, and the viewer quickly sees that it was Alex’s house. Their fate and the supernatural power that is running everything, a big mystery that is carefully hidden from the viewer until the final act, slowly comes together even as the tension builds. Outstanding film with plenty of heart-pounding moments, and one that I never want to see again. ★★★★★
Cloud is a Japanese thriller, and a tale of 2 parts. The first half is fantastic. Yoshii is a flipper, meaning he buys goods on the cheap and re-sells them online for a profit. In the beginning of the movie, he is purchasing a truck full of medical devices from a company going out of business, buying them for pennies on the dollar because the owner has no other choice but to accept the lowball offer. Yoshii turns his investment, nearly all the money he has, into over a million Yen, and his little business is off. A couple more transactions don’t go as well, but he is still doing OK, though starting to make enemies. His dirty handed tactics have gotten people upset, and Yoshii starts getting jumpy around his apartment when shadowy figures start hanging around and making threats. Yoshii rents a house outside of Tokyo, hires an assistant, and his girlfriend moves in too. Yoshii’s next buy is a wall-full of designer handbags, and when the assistant asks if they are real or counterfeit, Yoshii quips, “Who cares? We’ll make the same profit either way.” Well his buyers care, because the threats ramp up, and the police start sniffing around about counterfeit sales too. When Yoshii learns that there is an online group actively seeking Yoshii’s location because some past customers want payback, he tries to make a run for it, but by then it is too late. Up to this point in the movie, it was great stuff, with lots of intrigue and suspense, but after this point, it devolves into a ridiculous shoot-em-up flick. All of a sudden, the assistant is a trained fighter with ties to the Yakuza, and why is he so beholden to Yoshii anyway? Silly finale, but I’ll give it 3 stars for the first half. ★★★
Man, on a roll today, with another great film with Familiar Touch. A much more subtle movie that those above, it begins innocuously enough on an elderly woman, Ruth, preparing a meal. She gets it all set up just as a middle-aged man knocks on her front door and comes in. The two engage in playful banter, giving the impression of a date, even if the man, Steve, seems uncomfortable with some of Ruth’s advances. Finally, when she becomes more forward, Steve says it is time go, and packs Ruth into his car, along with a suitcase. She asks if they are going on a trip together, and Steve replies with a half-assed answer. They pull up to an old folks home, and Steve helps Ruth inside. When she asks what they are doing there, Steve replies, “Mom, you’ve been here before, remember? We’re moving you in today.” The truth that Ruth is suffering from dementia, to the point that she didn’t recognize her son, hits hard, and the movie only continues to add heartbreak from there. We really only see Ruth on her good days, and while she undoubtedly forgets people or why she’s there, she seems so “with it” that you can’t help but feel immense sadness that she is stuck there. She continues to do complex things like cook meals, and is outgoing and talkative to the staff. Unlike others on her floor, she’s aware of her surroundings and not “a zombie” or spaced out all the time. But there are reminders that it will only get worse and never better. One of the saddest moments in the film: Ruth is taking a shower after a swimming lesson, and she has an epiphany, saying aloud, “Steve, he’s my son… I won’t remember him.” It makes your heart ache. As our population gets older, it’s something more and more of us will have to face. ★★★★
Lurker is a timely film about the perils of stardom and what people will do to achieve it. Matthew is working at a clothing store when up-and-coming musician Oliver and his posse walk in. Matthew is a fan (we later see Oliver t-shirts in his closet) but, unlike other customers in the store who immediately fawn over him, Matthew plays it cool and feigns ignorance as to who Oliver is. Oliver finds it endearing and invites him back to his house to hang out. Over a few weeks, Matthew ingratiates himself into Oliver’s inner circle, and the other hangers-on see him as a threat; they care for nothing more than staying as close to Oliver as they can, and there is definitely a flowing hierarchy among them. They know people float in and out according to Oliver’s preferences. Once Matthew has gotten close, he becomes “one of them” as well, and see other newcomers as threats. When Matthew takes a drastic step to cut a newcomer out, Oliver retaliates and kicks Matthew out, but he will not go quietly. Matthew is willing to do whatever it takes to keep his position so close to stardom and the perks that it brings. A great thriller made for today’s celebrity fascinated masses. ★★★½
- TV series recently watched: Breaking Bad (season 3), Peacemaker (season 2), Walking Dead Darryl Dixon (season 3), The Diplomat (season 3)
- Book currently reading: Crossroads of Twilight by Robert Jordan
Jons Movie Takes 