THE OUTPOST (US - 2020) Directed by Rod Lurie. Written by Paul Tamasy and Eric Johnson. Cast: Scott Eastwood, Caleb Landry Jones, Orlando Bloom, Jack Kesy, Cory Hardrict, Milo Gibson, Jacob Scipio, Taylor John Smith, Jonathan Yunger, Alexander Arnold, George Arvidson, Will Attenborough, Chris Born, Ernest Cavazos, Scott Alda Coffey, Jack Devos, Sharif Dorani, Henry Hughes, James Jagger, Jack Kalian, Bobby Lockwood, Kwame Patterson, Daniel Rodriguez, Alfie Stewart, Trey Tucker, Brandon Wengryznek. (R, 123 mins)
THE OUTPOST is a harrowing chronicle of the Battle of Kamdesh, the bloodiest battle of the war in Afghanistan, taking place over a 12-hour period on October 3, 2009. In 2006, a series of outposts were created throughout the region to promote counterinsurgency, goodwill relations with locals, and to stop the flow of weapons and Taliban fighters coming in from Pakistan. PRT Kamdesh, which would eventually be renamed Camp Keating, was positioned in a cavernous area at the bottom of three peaks of the Hindu Kush Mountains, prompting one military analyst at the time to comment that it "might as well be called Camp Custer, because everyone at the outpost was going to die." Almost entirely surrounded by steep mountains with plenty of hiding places for the Taliban to mount an ambush, PRT Kamdesh is attacked in small bursts at least once a day, just to remind the Americans that they're constantly being observed. The outpost is run by CPT Keating (Orlando Bloom), who's respected by the men and also takes his role as diplomat seriously. He establishes a good relationship with the Afghan locals, but it's a harbinger of doom to come when he's killed by a bomb blast on patrol, prompting the renaming of PRT Kamdesh to Camp Keating in his honor.
Much of the first half of THE OUTPOST is spent on establishing the atmosphere and getting to know the characters, which does get a bit dizzying and hard to follow at times. The primary soldiers on which the film focuses are outsider Sgt. Ty Carter (Caleb Landry Jones), a Marine washout and a bad attitude case who routinely mouths off to superior officers and is generally regarded as an unreliable pain in the ass by everyone, and Staff Sgt. Clinton Romesha (Scott Eastwood), who's just been brought in with a new group as the film begins. There's a lot of ball-busting of the homophobic and racist variety to blow off steam ("You smell like a bag of dicks," says one, while another asks "If you had to fuck a guy, gun to your head, who would it be?" and the answer is "No gun necessary. Chuck Norris"), and one guy going off when he catches another jerking off to a stolen photo of his wife. Camp Keating goes through commanders in rapid succession: Keating's replacement, CPT Yllescas (Milo Gibson, one of Mel's sons), whose motto is "Embrace the suck," is, like his predecessor, killed by a bomb while on a routine patrol, and he's followed by the stern, standoffish CPT Broward (Kwame Patterson), who won't leave his quarters--even filling jars of piss for Carter to dispose--and there's soon whispers calling him "Broward the Coward." By the summer of 2009, Broward is relieved of duty and Keating is left in the temporary command of second-in-charge Lt. Bunderman (Taylor John Smith), with the outpost set to be closed by the Army by the first week of October. And at 5:58 am on October 3, 2009, over 300 Taliban and Afghan insurgents unleash hell from all sides of the surrounding mountains, the relentless attack coming from everywhere.
Based on the 2012 non-fiction book The Outpost: An Untold Story of American Valor by CNN anchor Jake Tapper (also one of about two dozen producers, along with Medal of Honor recipient Ty Carter), THE OUTPOST is directed by Rod Lurie, a West Point grad and film critic-turned-filmmaker who hasn't helmed a feature since his badly-received 2011 remake of Sam Peckinpah's STRAW DOGS. Lurie put himself in a no-win situation by remaking such an iconic film, but taken on its own terms, his version has its merits, especially with its sinister depiction of the underlying sense of menace in a small Southern town that doesn't take too kindly to outsiders. Of course, Lurie is best known for 2000's political drama THE CONTENDER, and while he's helmed other solid films (1999's DETERRENCE, 2001's THE LAST CASTLE, 2008's NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH), THE OUTPOST is his best work in the last 20 years. What's most surprising about THE OUTPOST is the fact that it's produced by Cannon cover band Millennium and was shot in their usual stomping grounds of Bulgaria. It speaks to Lurie's skill and dedication to the project--and perhaps everyone rallying around him when his 27-year-old son Hunter, to whom the film is dedicated, died unexpectedly during pre-production--that he manages to transcend Millennium's sometimes dubious budgetary constraints and quality-control issues and makes this film look like it came from a major studio. Even the clown crew at Bulgaria's Worldwide FX brings their A-game when it comes to the visual effects and CGI explosions.
With the B outfit Screen Media Films handling distribution, THE OUTPOST was likely doomed to a VOD release even before COVID-19 closed movie theaters indefinitely, but this is maybe the first new film I've seen since the advent of the pandemic that really should be seen on a big screen. Even at home, however, it succeeds as best it can in being an immersive experience, with Lurie presenting a seamlessly-edited, expertly-crafted 45-minute sequence in the second hour depicting the battle, with long takes and time spent establishing where everyone is in relation to others, creating coherence amidst the chaos, something many films of this sort don't really get a handle on. Jones does a terrific job of showing the arc of a character from screw-up to shattered hero without turning it into a cliche (and his acting in his final scene is reminiscent of Tom Hanks' breakdown in CAPTAIN PHILLIPS), while Eastwood, in a breakout performance, looks and sounds so much like his old man that it's actually eerie, especially when Broward chews out Romesha about returning fire on "suspicious activity" without authorization, and Eastwood seethes "Suspicious? So where were the bullets coming from, sir?" like Dirty Harry smarting off to a pencil-pushing boss. In addition to Eastwood and Gibson, other celebrity lineages are represented with Will Attenborough (grandson of Richard), Scott Alda Coffey (grandson of Alan Alda), and James Jagger (son of Mick), playing various soldiers at Camp Keating. A gritty, uncompromising look at the hell of war that's refreshingly lacking in tough guy posturing and jingoistic silliness typical of military actioners off the Millennium assembly line, THE OUTPOST is to the war in Afghanistan what BLACK HAWK DOWN was to the Battle of Mogadishu (fitting that Bloom is both movies), and it's one of the best films of the year so far.
Caleb Landry Jones, Rod Lurie (with pic of his late son Hunter),
and Scott Eastwood on the set of THE OUTPOST
Based on the acclaimed 1989 novel by Martin Amis, LONDON FIELDS' arduous journey to the screen has already taken its rightful place among cinema's most calamitous dumpster fires, while also confirming every suspicion that the book was unfilmable. David Cronenberg was originally attached to direct all the way back in 2001 before things fell apart in pre-production, with Michael Winterbottom (24 HOUR PARTY PEOPLE) and David Mackenzie (HELL OR HIGH WATER) also in the mix over the next several years. It wasn't until 2013 that filming actually commenced, with music video vet Mathew Cullen at the helm, making his feature directing debut, from a script initially written by Amis (his first screenplay since 1980's SATURN 3) and reworked by Roberta Hanley (VERONIKA DECIDES TO DIE). After a private press screening at the 2015 Toronto Film Festival, where the film was acquired by Lionsgate, the planned public festival screening was abruptly canceled due to various lawsuits being filed amidst a very public spat between Cullen and the producers. These included: several of the producers suing Cullen after he missed two deadlines for turning in the finished film and they found out he was off shooting a Katy Perry video instead of completing post-production; Cullen countersuing when producers took the film away from him and recut it themselves; the producers suing star Amber Heard for breach of contract after she refused to record some required voiceovers after production wrapped and badmouthed the film to the media; and Heard countersuing, claiming the producers violated her no-nudity clause by hiring a double to shoot explicit sex scenes involving her character after she left. Deciding they wanted no part of the rapidly escalating shitshow, Lionsgate dropped the film, which remained shelved until the fall of 2018 when settlements were reached with all parties and a compromised version--assembled by some of the producers and disowned by Cullen--was picked up by, of all distributors, GVN Releasing, a small company specializing in faith-based, evangelical, and conservative-leaning fare, which the very R-rated LONDON FIELDS is decidedly not.
A movie about the making of LONDON FIELDS would be more interesting than watching LONDON FIELDS, an incoherent mess that looks like it was desperately cobbled together using any available footage, with little sense of pacing or narrative flow. Seeking any spark of inspiration, blocked American writer Samson Young (Billy Bob Thornton) answers an ad to swap apartments with famed British crime novelist Mark Asprey (Jason Isaacs). While Asprey writes his latest bestseller in Young's shithole Hell's Kitchen hovel, Young works in Asprey's posh London pad and finds his muse in upstairs neighbor Nicola Six (Heard). A beguiling and clairvoyant femme fatale, Nicola wanders into the neighborhood pub wearing a black veil and mourning her own death, having a premonition of her inevitable murder--on her 30th birthday on the 5th of November, Guy Fawkes Day--at the hands of one of the three men she encounters: the dour and jaded Young; upwardly mobile investment broker Guy Clinch (Theo James, at the beginning of the apparently perpetual attempt to make Theo James happen); and skeezy, lowlife, would-be darts champ and Guy Ritchie caricature Keith Talent (Jim Sturgess), who owes a ton of money to scar-faced, bowler-hatted Cockney gangster and chief darts rival Chick Purchase (an uncredited Johnny Depp, long before his and Heard's very acrimonious split, which should give you an idea of how old this thing is). Observing near and from afar how Nicola manipulates the men in her life, the dying Young weaves a complex tale that becomes the great novel he's always had in him. It seems like there's some kind of twist near the end, but it's hard telling with what's here.
Cullen put together his own director's cut that got into a few theaters for some select special engagements. It runs 11 minutes longer and with many scenes in different order (for instance, Depp appears seven minutes into this version but not until 35 minutes into Cullen's cut), but the only version currently on home video is the shorter "producer's cut" that GVN released on 600 screens to the tune of just $433,000. It's doubtful, but there's perhaps a good--or at least better--film buried somewhere in the rubble, and there's some enjoyment to be had from the scenery-chewing contest going on between Depp and Sturgess, who gets a ridiculous scene where he's dancing in a torrential downpour to Dire Straits' "Money for Nothing." It's an amusingly silly sequence but therein lies the conundrum of LONDON FIELDS: it hasn't the slightest idea what it's doing or what it wants to be. Is it a romantic murder mystery? A drama about manipulation and obsession? A grotesque black comedy? The climactic tournament showdown with Keith and Chick gets perilously close to turning into a darts version of KINGPIN, with both Sturgess and Depp fighting over who gets to be Bill Murray's Big Ernie McCracken. It's easy to see why there were so many conflicting intentions on LONDON FIELDS: there's a ludicrous 12 production companies, 46 credited producers, four credited editors, and even three guys credited with doubling Thornton. Heard seems game to play a seductive and dangerous femme fatale in a twisty noir thriller, but LONDON FIELDS is not that movie. Or any kind of movie, for that matter. (R, 107 mins)
THE LAST MAN (Argentina/Canada - 2019)
The first narrative feature from Argentine documentary filmmaker Rodrigo H. Vila is a resounding failure on almost every front, save for some occasionally atmospheric location work in what appear to be some dangerous parts of Buenos Aires. A dreary, dipshit dystopian hodgepodge of THE MACHINIST, JACOB'S LADDER, and BLADE RUNNER, the long-shelved THE LAST MAN (shot in 2016 as NUMB, AT THE EDGE OF THE END, with a trailer under that title appearing online two years ago) is set in a constantly dark, rainy, and vaguely post-apocalyptic near-future in ruins from environmental disasters and global economic fallout. Combat vet Kurt Matheson (Hayden Christensen) is haunted by PTSD-related nightmares and hallucinations, usually in the form of a little boy who seems to know an awful lot about him, plus his dead war buddy Johnny (Justin Kelly) who may have been accidentally killed by Kurt in a friendly fire incident. Kurt also falls under the spell of messianic street preacher Noe (Harvey Keitel, looking like Vila caught him indulging in some C. Everett Koop cosplay), who tells his flock that "We are the cancer!" and that they must be prepared for a coming electrical storm that will bring about the end of civilization (or, on the bright side, the end of this movie). Kurt gets a job at a shady security firm in order to pay for the fortified bunker he becomes obsessed with building, and is framed for internal theft and targeted by his boss Antonio (LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE's Marco Leonardi as Almost Benicio Del Toro), while at the same time having a clandestine fling with the boss' ex-model daughter (Liz Solari).
Oppressively dull, THE LAST MAN is an incoherent jumble of dystopia and apocalypse cliches, dragged down by Christensen, who still can't act (2003's terrific SHATTERED GLASS remains the only film where his limitations have worked in his favor), and is saddled with trite, sub-Rick Deckard narration on top of that (at one point, he's actually required to gravely mumble "If you look into darkness, the darkness looks into you"). Vila's idea of humor is to drop classic rock references into the dialogue, with Kurt admonishing "Johnny! Be good!" to the dead friend only he can see, and apparent Pink Floyd fan Johnny retorting with "Shine on, you crazy diamond!" and "You're trading your heroes for ghosts!" And just because a seriously slumming Keitel is in the cast, Vila throws in a RESERVOIR DOGS standoff near the end between Kurt, Antonio, and Antonio's duplicitous right-hand man Gomez (Rafael Spregelburd). The gloomy and foreboding atmosphere Vila achieves with the Buenos Aires cityscapes is really the only point of interest here and is a strong indicator that he should stick to documentaries, because THE LAST MAN is otherwise unwatchable. (R, 104 mins) TYREL (US - 2018)
It's hard to not think of GET OUT while watching TYREL, and that's even before Caleb Landry Jones appears, once again cast radically against type as "Caleb Landry Jones." The latest from provocative Chilean filmmaker Sebastian Silva (NASTY BABY), TYREL is a slow-burning cringe comedy that takes a sometimes frustratingly ambiguous look at casual racism in today's society. With his girlfriend's family taking over their apartment for the weekend, Tyler (Jason Mitchell, best known from MUDBOUND and as Eazy-E in STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON), who runs the kitchen in an upscale BBQ restaurant, accompanies his friend Johnny (Christopher Abbott) to a remote cabin for a reunion of Johnny's buddies, who are gathering to celebrate Pete's (Jones) birthday. The cabin is owned by Nico (Nicolas Arze), and it's an eclectic mix of rowdy dudebros that even includes openly gay Roddy (Faith No More keyboardist Roddy Bottum). Tyler is already somewhat nervous as the outsider of the group and he's the only black man present, and things get off to a slightly awkward start when one of them thinks his name is "Tyrel," and Pete seemingly takes offense that Tyler doesn't remember meeting him on a prior occasion. The first night is mostly ballbusting (including casually throwing around the word "faggot" as a playful insult) and their usual drinking games that an uncomfortable Tyler doesn't feel like playing. He ducks out and pretends to go to sleep, which only earns Johnny's derision the next morning, so to put himself at ease, Tyler starts overdoing it, getting far too intoxicated over the course of the day, especially once a second group of guys, including rich, eccentric Alan (Michael Cera), show up.
Almost every comment is loaded with a potential misread, from questioning chef Tyler whether grits should be eaten with sugar or salt to someone asking "Is this a Rachel Dolezal thing...am I allowed to do this?" All of these guys are liberal and affluent to some degree, and TYREL speaks to how words and actions can be interpreted even if the intent isn't there, making the point that assumptions and belief systems are ingrained into one's psyche. No one says or does anything that's intended to be overtly offensive (Roddy brushes off the homophobic slur directed at another, because it's just guys being guys) or blatantly racist, but Tyler has been on the receiving end of it enough that his guard is always up. He frequently exacerbates the situation by overreacting in an irrational way, especially on the second day when he gets far more intoxicated than anyone else, even drunkenly helping himself to an expensive bottle of whiskey that was a gift for Pete, as Silva starts using subtly disorienting camera angles to convey Tyler's--and the audience's--increasing discomfort. TYREL is mainly about creating a mood of one unintentional microaggression after another, but Silva somewhat overstates the point by setting the getaway bash on the same weekend as President Trump's inauguration, a ham-fisted move that puts a challenging character piece squarely into "MESSAGE!" territory, especially when Alan breaks out a Trump pinata and smirks to Tyler, "Oh, you'll love this!" TYREL moves past that heavy-handed stumble, and ultimately, there's no big message to be had here, but while it seems slight on a first glance, much it will nevertheless stick with you. It's anchored by a perceptive performance by Mitchell, supported by an ensemble that's strong across the board, with a nice late-film turn by the late, great character actor Reg E. Cathey--in his last film before his February 2018 death from lung cancer--as one of Nico's neighbors. (Unrated, 87 mins)
Though THE FLORIDA PROJECT shares some surface similarities with the little-seen SUNLIGHT JR, it benefits from a loose, improvisational, verite feel with its effective location shooting in the seedy vicinity around Walt Disney World (whereas SUNLIGHT JR was filmed in economically-depressed areas of Clearwater). Six-year-old Moonee (Brooklynn Kimberly Prince) lives at the Magic Castle motel in Kissimmee with her single mother Halley (Bria Vinaite), who redefines the concept of the irresponsible parent. While Moonee plays with downstairs neighbor Scooty (Christopher Rivera) and Jancey (Valeria Cotto), a little girl who lives with her grandmother (Josie Olivo) at a nearby motel, Halley gets high, watches TV, and engages in various scams to get the necessary weekly rent money for Magic Castle manager Bobby (Willem Dafoe). The kids are a handful, and certainly products of their environment and upbringing, with Moonee especially prone to being a foul-mouthed brat. Bobby's patience is always wearing thin (when they spit on someone's car, spill ice cream in the office, or sneak into the maintenance room and turn off the power to the entire motel), but he's very protective of the kids and realizes it's not their fault. Director/co-writer Sean Baker (TANGERINE) lets the story develop very slowly, instead focusing on the world in which these characters live in ways that recall the work of British filmmaker Andrea Arnold. Vinaite's performance in particular is reminiscent of Katie Jarvis, a non-professional who won the lead in FISH TANK after Arnold happened to see her arguing with her boyfriend on a street corner, as well as Sasha Lane, who was cast in AMERICAN HONEY after Arnold saw her sunbathing on a beach. Likewise, Vinaite had no acting experience and ran a small marijuana-themed clothing line when Baker discovered her on Instagram. Her performance--Halley's attitude boiling with rage and desperation but doing what she does because she loves her child even if she still acts like one herself--is quite remarkable.
The same goes for young Prince, who's a natural (watch her give Jancey the tour of the motel and the rundown of the residents: "This guy gets arrested a lot and this lady thinks she's married to Jesus"), and both actresses work beautifully with an Oscar-nominated Dafoe, playing perhaps the warmest and most empathetic character in a career largely spent personifying creeps and weirdos. Baker delves into a little of Bobby's life too and the wrong turns that make him sympathize with Halley and Moonee, even when Halley doesn't really deserve it. We see Bobby's day-to-day job duties, which include fixing a broken ice machine, dealing with the removal of a mattress in a bedbug-infested room, chasing a pedophile off the property when he starts talking to the kids, plus he has a fractured relationship with his own son (Caleb Landry Jones), who he frequently calls to help him with stuff around the motel. Perhaps the most moving scene in the film is when Halley and Moonee take Jancey to an empty field to watch the Disney fireworks from a distance for her birthday, celebrated by blowing out a candle on a small cupcake the three of them share. As the fragments begin to cohere into a genuine story, the outcome isn't going to be good, but it does put you in the mindset of children forced to use their imagination to survive the grimmest of circumstances. (R, 112 mins)
BLADE OF THE IMMORTAL (Japan/UK - 2017)
A lot of years have gone by, but it's easy to forget the impact that incredibly prolific Japanese auteur Takashi Miike had on connoisseurs of cult cinema when his films began hitting the US in the early '00s. That first wave--AUDITION, DEAD OR ALIVE, MPD PSYCHO, VISITOR Q, ICHI THE KILLER, THE HAPPINESS OF THE KATAKURIS, and even the much-maligned GOZU--were so gonzo and transgressive that even hardcore cult cinephiles were often left aghast at that they were seeing (after I described VISITOR Q to a friend, he screened it at a movie night at his place, pissing off half of his guests and gleefully describing it as "a total room-clearer"). Miike was known enough in horror circles by 2005 that he was invited to helm an episode of Showtime's MASTERS OF HORROR series. The result was "Imprint," which went into such dark and disturbing places that the cable network wouldn't even air it. Miike has been directing since 1991 and has dabbled in every conceivable genre (even retro spaghetti westerns and kids movies), hopping around from cinematic extremes to mainstream commercial fare (he also helmed the J-Horror hit ONE MISSED CALL) with remarkable ease, but while his notoriety in the US has diminished in recent years, his output hasn't slowed down at all. His latest effort, BLADE OF THE IMMORTAL, is his first to get any US distribution beyond the festival circuit since 2015's YAKUZA APOCALYPSE. To give you an idea of how much and how fast Miike works, the last of his films I've seen is 2011's HARA-KIRI: DEATH OF A SAMURAI, and between that and BLADE OF THE IMMORTAL, he's made 13 feature films and had a hand in directing two different series for Japanese television, and since BLADE wrapped, he's already got another movie completed.
BLADE OF THE IMMORTAL was sold as Miike's 100th film. While the exact tally is a mystery and might even be to Miike himself, this is an odd choice to herald such a milestone. It's based on a popular manga by Hiroaki Samura, but Miike doesn't really bring much of a personal touch to it. As he pushes 60, it's entirely possible he's moved beyond the poking-people-with-sticks years that helped establish his legend (or he's just exhausted), and while he's done very well in this genre before (2010's 13 ASSASSINS was his best film in years), he really seems to be going through the motions with BLADE OF THE IMMORTAL. The convoluted story has disgraced samurai warrior Manji (Takuya Kimura) on the run after killing his corrupt lord and his six shogun constables, including his brother-in-law, whose death drove Manji's sister Machi (Hana Sugisaki) mad with grief. After Machi is killed by a bounty hunter and Manji massacres his small army, he nearly dies from his injuries until he's granted immortality by 800-year-old witch Yaobikuni (Yoko Yamamoto). 50 years later, a depressed Manji wanders the countryside wishing he could die, but he finds a purpose when he's sought out by Rin Asani (also played by Sugisaki), who wants revenge on shogun warrior Kagehisa Anotsu (Sota Fukushi) after he kills her parents and gives his associate Kuroi Sabato (Kazuka Kitamura) the severed head of her mother to mount on his shoulder. Manji feels sorry for the girl, who reminds him of his baby sister and may very well be her reincarnation (Rin even starts affectionately calling him "Big Brother"), so they embark on a journey to kill Anotsu and anyone who stands in their way. Of course, there's shifting alliances, double crosses, and various supernatural hijinks, but after a smashing start, the film rapidly devolves into repetitive set pieces and becomes a laborious slog. Even when it comes alive for an epic climactic showdown, it still feels like Miike's just recycling ideas and images from 13 ASSASSINS and other similar films. Manji is a sort of Wolverine/Logan crossed with a shogun HIGHLANDER, so no matter what happens to him or how many appendages get hacked off in battle, the "bloodworms" planted in him by Yaobikuni will heal him by reattaching the limb and he continues to live. There's plenty of spectacular action sequences and squishy sound effects as inventive weaponry guts through flesh, and KILL BILL fans will like seeing Chiaka Kuriyama--aka "Gogo Yubari"--in a supporting role, but at nearly two and a half hours, BLADE OF THE IMMORTAL is a good 35-40 minutes too long as Miike somehow manages to be both self-indulgent and disconnected from the material at the same time. (R, 141 mins)
THREE BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING, MISSOURI (UK/US - 2017) Written and directed by Martin McDonagh. Cast: Frances McDormand, Woody Harrelson, Sam Rockwell, Peter Dinklage, John Hawkes, Abbie Cornish, Lucas Hedges, Caleb Landry Jones, Clarke Peters, Zeljko Ivanek, Amanda Warren, Samara Weaving, Sandy Martin, Kerry Condon, Brendan Sexton III, Darrell Britt-Gibson, Kathryn Newton, Malaya Rivera Drew, Jerry Winsett, Nick Searcy. (R, 115 mins) With its dark humor, small-town cops, generous doses of local color, quotable dialogue, shocking bursts of unexpected violence, and Frances McDormand heading the cast, it's inevitable that THREE BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING, MISSOURI will draw comparisons to the Coen Bros.' FARGO. But it quickly makes its case as very much its own film, and it's the best work yet from Martin McDonagh, the British writer/director who gave us the great IN BRUGES and the half-great (loved the first half, didn't care for the second) SEVEN PSYCHOPATHS. McDonagh expertly captures the small-town, rural atmosphere and succeeds in making every major character complex and multi-dimensional. Lesser films would've made everything that transpires black and white and one-sided, stacking the deck against the main character to maximize sympathy, but in THREE BILLBOARDS, everything is in shades of gray. Even the most loathsome characters have redeeming qualities, and while the outrageously foul-mouthed insults and seething anger fly fast and furious, THREE BILLBOARDS is, at its core, one of the warmest, honest, and most emotional films to hit theaters in some time.
Seven months after her teenage daughter Angela was raped, doused in gasoline, and burned to a crisp, Mildred Hayes (McDormand) has run out of patience. There's no leads, no breaks, and local police are still reeling from a recent scandal where Dixon (Sam Rockwell), a racist cop with serious anger management issues, beat and tortured a black suspect. Consumed with bitterness and rage and past her breaking point, Mildred rents out three billboards near her home outside the tiny town of Ebbing, MO, on a virtually abandoned stretch of road that's been rarely used in the 30 years since a nearby highway was constructed. They say, in succession, "Raped While Dying," "And Still No Arrests?" and "How Come, Chief Willoughby?" Understandably, police chief Bill Willoughby (Woody Harrelson) is upset, explaining to Mildred that there was no DNA match, no witnesses, and nothing for them to go on. The billboards attract the attention of the local and regional media and earn Mildred the scorn of Ebbing's residents, with none more furious than Dixon, who repeatedly tries to intimidate and bully Mildred and local ad agency owner Red Welby (Caleb Landry Jones) into taking them down. People also resent Mildred's aggressively calling out Willoughby since it's the worst-kept secret in Ebbing that the chief, married to Anne (Abbie Cornish) and with two young daughters, is terminally ill with pancreatic cancer and doesn't have long to live.
To say much more about the relentlessly busy plot would spoil the rich rewards THREE BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING, MISSOURI has to offer. The billboards have an effect on everyone: Willoughby, a good man trying to do his job and being put in an awkward position while facing his certain death; Mildred's son Robbie (MANCHESTER BY THE SEA's Lucas Hedges), who's already having a hard time getting over the death of his older sister (he thanks his mom for the billboards "in case I go more than two minutes without thinking about her"); and Mildred's ex-husband Charlie (John Hawkes), a wife-beater still prone to violent tendencies who's taken up with 19-year-old Penelope (THE BABYSITTER's Samara Weaving). But none are impacted more than Dixon, and Rockwell rises to the challenge with the film's most difficult role and most expansive and unexpected character arc, simultaneously presented as a dipshit, mama's boy cop who took six years to get through the police academy, a virulent and unapologetic racist and homophobe, and ultimately, a guy capable of recognizing the mistakes he's made and doing something to right his many wrongs. It's national treasure McDormand's film for obvious reasons, and it's probably her finest work since FARGO, but an Oscar-worthy Rockwell has never been better. All of the actors get a chance to shine, even if they only have a couple of scenes (especially Weaving as the sweet but dim Penelope, and Peter Dinklage as the local used car salesman and town drunk who has an unrequited crush on Mildred), and McDonagh's dialogue, while occasionally coming off as a little too scripted (particularly Mildred's rant at a local priest played by Nick Searcy), is brutal and lacerating in its misanthropic fury that's also occasionally sweet, if you can believe that. Only in THREE BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING, MISSOURI could "cunt" be a term of endearment from a son to his mom and sister. It's a moving, perceptive, tragic, funny, and devastating look at grief, choices, and the haunting regret of words and actions that you'd give anything to take back. It's one of the best films of the year.
Nominated for 2016's Best Foreign Language Film Oscar (it lost to Asghar Farhadi's THE SALESMAN), TONI ERDMANN was one of the most critically-praised arthouse titles of last year. The third film from acclaimed German writer/director Maren Ade, and her first since 2009's EVERYONE ELSE, TONI ERDMANN has some amusing moments, heartfelt observations, and fine performances from its two leads, but at an absurdly bloated 162 minutes, there's simply too much of it, as Ade obviously loved everything she shot so much that she wasn't willing to part with any of it. Winfried Conradi (Austrian actor Peter Simonischek) is a retired, widower music teacher and an affable eccentric, an incessant prankster who's introduced answering the door for a package and telling the delivery driver it was ordered by his brother, who's just been paroled from prison where he was serving time for sending mail bombs. He excuses himself to get his brother, who's revealed to just be Winfried in a different robe, with a wig and fake teeth. The set of fake teeth is his go-to prop, and when his beloved, elderly, and blind dog Willi dies, Winfried is sure to take them with him to Bucharest, where he drops in for an unannounced visit with his daughter Ines (Sandra Huller, so memorable in 2006's REQUIEM). Ines is a consultant for firm dealing in oil export, and it shouldn't come as a surprise that her goofball dad gets in the way despite her insistence that he keep his silliness at a distance. Winfried is a free spirit who wants to enjoy the moments as they happen and not take life so seriously. He tries to pass this philosophy on to Ines, but she's only focused on her work, and the two have a falling out ("Do you have any plans in life other than slipping fart cushions under people?") after she misses an important meeting because she dozed off and Winfried didn't wake her.
That's the first hour of TONI ERDMANN. There's a lot of insider talk about the corporate world and how the structure is such that Ines has to work twice as hard as her male counterparts to make an impression, and even after she delivers a presentation to her boss Henneberg (Michael Wittenborn), he concludes the meeting with "Well, gents," choosing only to address the men in the room. Ade makes salient points like this, but belabors them. It's roughly 65 minutes in before we finally meet "Toni Erdmann," who shows up at a bar where Ines is having drinks with two female colleagues. "Toni" is clearly Winfried in his most grandiose prank yet, with a shaggy black wig and those same fake teeth, the Tony Clifton to his Andy Kaufman, claiming to be a life coach visiting Bucharest for the funeral of his Italian dentist friend's turtle. This kind of absurdist humor provides the highlights of TONI ERDMANN, but these moments are too sporadic. As "Toni," Winfried keeps following Ines around, meddling in her work life, eventually working his way into her office to act as a life coach for Henneborg and later trying to pass himself off as the German ambassador to Romania. Ade eventually caves to shock comedy with a pair of much-talked about scenes that really aren't that funny: one in a hotel room where Ines denies sex to workplace friend-with-benefits Tim (Trystan Putter), forcing him to masturbate and ejaculate on to a tray of petits four brought up by room service, after which she scarfs down one of the semen-covered appetizers. The other is the impromptu "naked party" sequence that was hailed as a set piece of Blake Edwards-ian genius but is really just awkward, uncomfortable, and not funny, especially when Winfried crashes it wearing a Bulgarian kukeri costume. Of course, it goes for sentiment at the end when father and daughter reach an understanding, but should it have taken a meandering and punishing two hours and 40 minutes to get there? TONI ERDMANN has already been deemed a modern classic, and yeah, there's some big laughs scattered throughout, Huller has a great incredulous, deadpan glare and convincingly belts out an impressive version of Whitney Houston's "The Greatest Love of All," and Simonischek often demonstrates a kind of Peter Sellers-meets-Sasha Baron Cohen quality with his endless antics (though his "Toni Erdmann" get-up really looks a lot like the late, great Alan Bates). With a 93% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, I'm obviously in the minority by not adoring this film, but by the two-hour point, part of me was hoping Winfried would choke to death on those goddamn fake teeth the next time he slipped them into his mouth with an impish grin. A Hollywood remake is already in the works, with Kristen Wiig and Jack Nicholson in his first film since 2010's HOW DO YOU KNOW? (R, 162 mins)
WAR ON EVERYONE (UK/UAE - 2016; 2017 US release)
An equal opportunity offender, the aptly-titled WAR ON EVERYONE is a bile-soaked, misanthropic screed of a buddy/cop movie from Irish writer/director John Michael McDonagh (THE GUARD, CALVARY). The story centers on two outrageously dirty cops running rampant in Albuquerque, New Mexico: brainy and philosophical Bob Bolano (Michael Pena) and impulsive anger management case Terry Monroe (Alexander Skarsgard). Sort of like a well-dressed STARSKY AND HUTCH filtered through BAD LIEUTENANT, Bolano and Monroe are introduced deliberately running over a mime and telling a witness that they can get away with because they're cops. They've just been taken off suspension by the perpetually flustered Lt. Stanton (Paul Reiser) after allegations of bribery and corruption and an unfortunate incident involving Bolano beating the shit out of a racist colleague who called him a "wetback," with Stanton explaining "This is the police department! We're surrounded by racist pigs!" but empathizing by explaining "I get it that he's racist...I understand. I'm married to a chink. I have chink kids." That's WAR ON EVERYONE in a nutshell: a feature-length trigger warning that wallows in cheap shots not just at Asians, but at African-Americans, homosexuals, transgender, Muslims, Quakers, dyslexics, overweight kids, people with MS, bad British teeth, the mentally ill, Stephen Hawking, and the Irish, just to show McDonagh's not excluding anyone. Much of it is admittedly funny in a "Did they just go there?" kind-of way, but WAR ON EVERYONE's convoluted plot feels like a half-baked rough draft that Shane Black scribbled out and would've tossed aside until he could devote his full attention to it. After framing an informant named Reggie X (Malcolm Barrett) with drug possession, Reggie coughs up some info: he was the getaway driver for a $1 million racetrack heist orchestrated by sleazy, heroin-addicted British dignitary Lord James Mangan (Theo James). After numerous run-ins with Mangan and his fey underling, strip club manager Russell Birdwell (Caleb Landry Jones as old-school Crispin Glover), Bolano and Monroe plot to steal the racetrack take for themselves which, naturally, leaves a trail of corpses all over Albuquerque.
There's also time for Monroe to have a romance with stripper Jackie (Tessa Thompson of CREED), and for him to find the caring soul within when it comes to Danny (Zion Leyba), a nice kid whose mother's been arrested for killing his father for reasons that are deliberately left obscure but, of course, will tie into the main plot much later. There's a lot in WAR ON EVERYONE that's amusing, but too much of it is just posturing attitude and characters saying things just to see how offensive the film can get. Elsewhere, McDonagh (the older brother of IN BRUGES writer/director Martin McDonagh) tries too hard to do some post-Tarantino pop culture riffing, with Monroe being an obsessive Glen Campbell fanatic (there's a Monroe/Jackie dance number set to "Rhinestone Cowboy"), Bolano and Reggie griping that "you can't see Jennifer Lopez's tits" in OUT OF SIGHT, and Monroe trying to recall if the first movie he ever saw was THE BLUE LAGOON or DOC SAVAGE: MAN OF BRONZE. There's scattered moments where WAR ON EVERYONE gets some momentum going and scores an occasional sterling bit of quotable dialogue ("European jizz?"), and James (the DIVERGENT series) makes a truly loathsome villain, but McDonagh probably should've given his script another polish before rolling the cameras. (R, 98 mins)
TANK 432 (UK - 2016)
There's a strong sense of the familiar with TANK 432. It's produced by cult filmmaker Ben Wheatley (KILL LIST, HIGH-RISE, the upcoming FREE FIRE), and it's the feature writing/directing debut of protege Nick Gillespie, who's served as a camera operator on all of Wheatley's films. The plot begins with faint echoes of Neal Marshall's DOG SOLDIERS before becoming something more surreal and psychological and by the end, it feels like a longer-than-usual episode of BLACK MIRROR, something that's probably inevitable in UK genre fare given the show's popularity and fervent following. An enemy is closing in on a team of mercenaries led by blustery, barking Smith (Gordon Kennedy), who orders everyone to retreat and leave injured Capper (Wheatley semi-regular Michael Smiley) behind with a bone jutting out of his leg. Smith has two hooded prisoners in orange jumpsuits and they pick up another tag-along in an unnamed woman (Alex March), who they find in utter hysterics until she's sedated by medic Karlsson (Deirdre Mullins). The squad is rounded out by unstable Gantz (Steve Garry), who's already seeing flashing visions of a barely-discernible creature following them, and requisite voice-of-reason Reeves (Rupert Evans, of Amazon's THE MAN IN THE HIGH CASTLE), who's struggling to hold it together. After finding several headless bodies of decapitated mercenaries in a barn, Smith leads everyone--minus one of the two prisoners who's killed a scuffle, leaving only Annabella (April Pearson) as the recovered quarry in their unspecified assignment--to an abandoned tank in the middle of an empty field. Deciding it's the safest place to take refuge from whatever is pursuing them, they all pile into its cramped, claustrophobic confines.
It isn't long before everyone's sanity starts to crumble, especially once they're inside and the only door in or out is jammed and no one can pry it open. Whatever's after them taunts them from outside, clanging and banging on the tank. Gantz unsuccessfully tries to start the tank, shits himself, and goes catatonic after being exposed to a strange orange powder. And Karlsson finds a box filled with files--on each of them. Too much of TANK 432 is just everyone shouting at one another, and Gillespie tips his hand too early with constant shots of Smith eyeballing everyone, scribbling in a notebook, and being evasive whenever anyone asks what he's writing, making it fairly obvious that things aren't what they seem, there's some kind of secret, and that Smith is on it. When that secret is finally revealed, it's hardly worth the elaborate and shouty buildup. Gillespie does a decent job establishing a tense atmosphere early on, but the film eventually grows tedious, and by the time Capper improbably reappears, Gillespie and Wheatley just let their buddy Smiley run rampant, ranting and yelling and basically hijacking the climax. (Unrated, 88 mins, also streaming on Netflix)
GET OUT (US - 2017) Written and directed by Jordan Peele. Cast: Daniel Kaluuya, Allison Williams, Catherine Keener, Bradley Whitford, Caleb Landry Jones, Stephen Root, Lakeith Stanfield, Marcus Henderson, Betty Gabriel, Lil Rel Howery, Richard Herd, Erika Alexander, Trey Burvant. (R, 104 mins) GET OUT is getting the best reviews of any 2017 release thus far, and when a genre film shows any degree of insight and razor-sharp social commentary, it's easy to overrate it. But GET OUT is one of the best and smartest fright flicks to come along in a while--caustic, uncomfortable, and refusing to pull punches, but remembering to be entertaining and witty at the same time. It deftly balances the majority of its time being genuinely unnerving but also with more than its share of funny moments, some engineered to make you laugh out loud and others designed to make you uneasy. The directing debut of KEY AND PEELE's Jordan Peele, who also scripted, GET OUT stars Daniel Kaluuya (SICARIO and the "Fifteen Million Merits" episode of BLACK MIRROR) as Chris Washington, a 26-year-old photographer who's about to go away for the weekend to meet the parents of Rose Armitage (GIRLS' Allison Willliams), his girlfriend of four months. He's a bit nervous--he's black, she's white, and she hasn't told them--but she assures him that they won't have a problem with him. The ride there includes a collision with a deer and an unpleasant run-in with a local cop (Chris is quick to comply, realizing it doesn't take much for a situation to escalate from zero to Trayvon Martin), but once at the estate of the wealthy Armitages, things are pleasant if awkward. Rose's mom Missy (Catherine Keener) is a psychiatrist who wants to hypnotize Chris to help him quit smoking, and her neurologist dad Dean (Bradley Whitford) means well but tries too hard to ingratiate himself, with everything from repeatedly calling Chris "My man," to numerous mentions that he "would've voted for Obama a third time," and asking how long Chris and Rose's "thaaang" has been going on.
Chris has a strange dinner conversation with Rose's brother Jeremy (Caleb Landry Jones) where Jeremy tells him he has the physique to be a monster MMA fighter. He's also taken aback by the presence of two oddly-behaving black employees--groundskeeper Walter (Marcus Henderson) and housekeeper Georgina (Betty Gabriel)--who aren't very good at conversation and have dead, vacant stares in their eyes. Dean says he hired them to help out when his parents were ailing and after they died, he didn't have the heart to let them go ("I know how it looks," Dean says). The Armitages hold a party for all of their wealthy and almost across-the-board elderly friends, all of whom try too hard to appeal to Chris, whether it's feeling his biceps, mentioning how much they like Tiger Woods, or making winking assumptions about how well-endowed he must be. Chris seems to be used to well-intentioned whites trying too hard but something isn't sitting well with him. He believes Missy hypnotized him without his knowledge and he recognizes Logan (Lakeith Stanfield), the young black companion of a 30-years-older white woman, as Andre, an old acquaintance of a friend of a friend who went missing six months ago. Chris takes a pic of him to send to his dog-sitting buddy Rod (a scene-stealing Lil Rel Howell) but he forgets to turn off the flash and it causes a brief seizure where Logan, who dresses like an old man and has no idea how to fist-bump, snaps out of his stupor and seems to briefly take on another personality until he's attended to by Missy. Rod theorizes that "rich white people are brainwashing brothers into becoming sex slaves," and while Chris laughs it off, his paranoia grows more intense by the minute and he can't ignore his gut feeling that something is very wrong here.
Of course, something is wrong but GET OUT doesn't quite go in the direction the trailers and your initial assumptions might indicate. It invokes a few classics from the 1970s, from THE WICKER MAN to MESSIAH OF EVIL and one in particular that's too much of a spoiler to mention. Despite its modern themes, it actually feels like a 1970s movie in both its working in of social issues and the emphasis on building suspense instead of focusing on gore and cheap jump scares (though a couple of jump scares here work quite well). In the end, GET OUT ends up being more about class division than racial injustice, a scathing rebuke not just of white privilege but also the entitlement of the wealthy for whom money--and people--are no object. No one is immune from criticism--even Chris is shown time and again to be a pushover and someone who doesn't want to rock the boat. Peele's script piles on the unease and the dread until it's almost suffocating, broken up by Rod's comic relief that's actually a welcome breather from the choking tension (Rod's Jeffrey Dahmer rant is one for the ages). Performances are pitch perfect across the board, whether it's Whitford's vaguely passive-aggressive glad-handing as Dean or Gabriel's often heartbreaking turn as Georgina, whose constant smile always seems a little too forced, masking a sadness that isn't lost on Chris. Alternately frightening, funny, and thought-provoking, with the kind of crowd-pleasing finale that horror movies used to know how to deliver, GET OUT isn't a quite an instant classic, but it's one of the stronger genre offerings of late, and one that establishes Peele, already a respected comedian and satirist, as a serious filmmaker to watch.
