The Fighter (review)
Posted: 2011/09/10 Filed under: Cinema | Tags: biography, david o. russell, drama, review, sport, the fighter 2 Comments »A movie about boxing nominated for seven Academy Awards? Boyfriend and I had to see it. (The first TV show we ever watched together was Hajime No Ippo, a Japanese anime about a boy who gets into boxing and eventually becomes a champion.) So we did. I liked it.
The movie follows a moment in the career of welterweight boxer “Irish” Micky Ward (Mark Wahlberg) as he struggles to make it big. We soon realize that his family, who play a big role in his private and professional life, are at least as much a hindrance to his ambitions as the help they claim to be. While his seven sisters are fiercely loyal to the family clan, his mother Alice (Melissa Leo), a bossy, chain-smoking peroxided blonde, works as his manager, and his ex-boxer, now crack addict of a brother Dicky (Christian Bale) “trains” him. White trash America in all its glory―and misery.
In the first part of the plot, different events coincide to make Micky finally break away from his family’s control: his defeat in an unfair match his mother and brother encouraged him to fight, his new, plain-speaking girlfriend Charlene (Amy Adams), but most especially Dicky’s own reckless behaviour, which lands him in jail and thus sets Micky “free”. In the second part, though, Micky realizes that his brother still knows him better than anybody else. In the meantime, Dicky’s prison time has weaned him away from his addiction, so he is ready to train seriously when he comes home. After some resistance, Charlene and Dicky both recognize that they must move on and compromise if they want to help Micky reach his goal.
Mark Wahlberg is 40 in real life (Melissa Leo, who plays his mother, was 11 when he was born). Yet there is a kind of schoolboy look about him that allows him to keep being cast in the role of “good little brother”. Micky Ward indeed reminded me a little of Wahlberg’s part in We Own the Night, where he plays the proper, respectable brother to Joaquin Phoenix’s dissolute character. But in The Fighter, it creates the paradox of having the main character also be the blandest. Micky is your everyday ordinary good guy; his only distinctive feature is that he can box. Aside from that, everybody around him seems to have more personality: his brother, his mother, his girlfriend, his stepfather… They’re all characters. No wonder Leo and Bale got nominations for Oscars (Leo even went to win it).
On another note, I liked the happy ending. I liked that Charlene always came around after she got mad, or that Dicky left jail in better shape and with a clearer conscience than when he’d entered it. There’s also enough boxing in the movie to enjoy, if you like watching boxing; aside from that, it’s about family and, peripherally, crack addiction. Knowing it’s based on a true story only makes it more interesting. (And another evidence that happy ends are not necessarily less “realistic” than tragic ones.)
And last, because I’m very proud to have any kind of culture, at some point Dicky sings the Bee Gees. For you all who didn’t know I Started a Joke by heart, here it is:
Did you see The Fighter? Did you like it? Do you think it deserved so many nominations for the Academy Awards?
Thor, Rio, Barney’s Version (reviews)
Posted: 2011/06/14 Filed under: Cinema | Tags: action, adaptation, adventure, animation, barney's version, carlos saldanha, comedy, drama, kenneth branagh, review, richard j. lewis, rio, thor 3 Comments »Seen three movies in the past weeks which I thought deserved at least one paragraph each on this blog. Call it an exercise in brevity for someone so prone to rambling as I.
1) Thor
“From the studio that brought you Iron Man.” Something must have escaped me, because I absolutely failed to like Iron Man when I watched it. Now Thor was quite another matter. As my boyfriend would say, I’m probably a typical girl and not enough of a tech geek, but I do like fantasy, mythology-inspired superheroes better than pseudo-scientific ones. As it happens, the whole fantasy aspect in Thor was really well-done IMO, even though my personal tastes didn’t always match those of the costume designer. And yes, the story’s very cliched, very predictable, but who cares as long as it worked? The plot flowed perfectly, with nice touches of humour in the midst of a generally unrealistic context. But the thing that really struck me was how much I enjoyed Loki once he grew a backbone and became the villain, to the extent I almost felt like rooting for him in his final battle against Thor. Plus I am naturally inclined to support anyone who’s got the fashion sense to wear green. 
2) Rio
Blu, a domesticated rainforest parrot who’s never been able to fly, goes back to his country of origin to reproduce with the last other blue macaw left. But once in Rio de Janeiro, unplanned adventures await him and his owner Linda, especially since it’s… Carnaval!! A regular good quality animated movie, Rio‘s originality mainly lies in its choice setting which, as the title suggests, goes beyond mere decor to play an actual part in the story. Two of my friends who went there this March assured me that everything was very accurate and well-rendered; moreover, for a person who likes dancing and partying as much as I do, all the carnaval-themed scenes were a lot of fun. Can’t wait to go there for real…
3) Barney’s Version
Barney’s Version is adapted from the prize-winning novel of Mordecai Richler, a Montreal-born Jewish author. Other than it being nice to see one’s hometown through a movie, I felt like this was an honest, but still insufficient attempt at bringing a complex novel on film. “The picaresque and touching story of the politically incorrect, fully lived life of the impulsive, irascible and fearlessly blunt Barney Panofsky,” says Imdb, and what my boyfriend told me of the book, which he’s read and loved, coincided with this description. Unfortunately, the movie itself didn’t. While there is definitely a compelling quality to the storyline, and many evocative scenes, the whole gave an overall impression of promising more than it was delivering. Instead of the colourful, though far from perfect Barney we’re sold, we get a less-than-charming, foolish, typically male egoist. Why any of his wives married him in the first place remains a mystery, and why they left him seems only fair. Not a bad movie, but one which left me seriously pissed off at men.
Top Girls, by Caryl Churchill (review?)
Posted: 2011/05/14 Filed under: Literature, Politics | Tags: caryl churchill, drama, feminism, review, top girls 9 Comments »My friend @I talk to pencils having subtly requested I review Top Girls, a 1982 play by English dramatist Caryl Churchill, I took the cue and read it this week. But as for reviewing it… hence the question mark.
It’s a book that seems more likely to spark a dozen conversations than one which it is easy to judge per se. To the point: did I like it? Of course. I didn’t actually expect to say things like, “it’s clumsily written” or “the plot is hackneyed” about a play someone is given to read in lit class. So… did I agree with it? And that’s where trouble begins. What exactly is the author trying to say? The end of the play feels like one big question mark, which is not a bad thing, but certainly seems to rummage through the reader more than the reader can hope to rummage through the piece itself.
You think you’re going to read about fictional characters, about other people’s lives. Not yours. Be able to get away from yourself for a while. Isn’t that what literature is for? Escapism, right? Yet this play is like a stick poking into your brain and your heart and your guts, a mirror which forces you to examine your own reflection. Comfortable? Not always. But fascinating, for sure.
Maybe it’s just me. Maybe it’s just me these days. (But I doubt it, if this play is more or less of a classic.) Top Girls is about being a woman; it’s about the entrapment and contradictions (more than just the hardships) being a woman implies. There is a kind of impossibility in that fact. Being a woman. Antithesis? I don’t mean to sound pessimistic by suggesting that, nor do I think that Top Girls is a hopeless or depressing work (first off, it’s way too interrogative for that). It is often almost comical, interspersed with weirdly enthusiastic sparkles, just like a woman’s life is.
So what should a woman do? I cannot give an answer because I don’t know what the answer is myself. All I know is that God, I feel what Ms. Churchill is showing us. I know exactly what it’s like. And I hope I find my way out of this maze someday.
After this questionable attempt at a review, I’d be glad to discuss any specific topic this book covers… I’m just not sure where to start. Comment please 
On another topic, since I often have a hard time deciding which book to read and review (aka R&R), I’ve made a poll for you, dear readers, to guide my next review:
The Kids Are All Right (review)
Posted: 2011/04/16 Filed under: Bio, Cinema | Tags: comedy, drama, family, lisa chodolenko, review, the kids are all right 1 Comment »
I’d originally seen The Kids Are All Right‘s trailer while at the theatre for another movie, but only when I saw Annette Bening at the Academy Awards ceremony was I reminded that it had seemed fun, interesting, and had made me curious to watch it. I mean, a movie with lesbian parents which both focuses on their specificity (the main plot stems from their needing a sperm donor to have children) and emphasizes their normality? Great!
Indeed, if there’s one thing you’ll remember after seeing The Kids Are All Right, it’s how much like every other parent Nic (Annette Bening) and Jules (Julianne Moore) are. Lisa Chodolenko’s film is not about lesbians; it’s really and only about family. And I happen to be a total sucker for family values… From as far as I can recall, I’ve always wanted to have a family; and it’s only getting worse as I am getting older. What used to be an abstract desire has now become very concrete and real. I’ve got the father. I’ve likely got the city. So when do we start making babies?! It’s a wonderful feeling.
The “kids” of the story, Joni (Mia Wasikowska) and her little brother Laser (Josh Hutcherson), are also typical teenagers. A quality which doesn’t necessarily call forth a very flattering picture; except if you’re like me, if you’re like Lisa Chodolenko, or like her characters, in one word if you like children. (I’m using “children” in a broad meaning here, including young adults who still go to school and live at their parents’.) Children are for better and for worse, and I totally understand people who feel like it’s too much for them at the moment. I’m just not one of them.
As for Paul (Mark Ruffalo), he obviously did think he was one of those, until he meets his biological offspring. And then, smack! he realizes that he’s getting old and he hasn’t got any family of his own. Also, talk about the temptation to get kids who are already almost grown-up, all raised and everything… I said earlier that children were for better and for worse; Paul’s reaction felt to me like an immature desire to have children only for the “better” part of the bargain. So typically male…
My boyfriend, who watched the movie with me, was obviously more sensitive to Paul’s side of the conflict. You bet he was identifying, ha ha. When we met, he would refer to having children as some kind of social pressure which he felt more with each year passing; now he’s totally reversed to a I-want-kids-ASAP mood. It’s so easy when you don’t have to get pregnant, isn’t it? For the record, he also thought that the two main actresses weren’t very believable as lesbians, most especially Moore. I personally thought the script was quite convincing, and just went with it. Not a life-changing movie by any means, but definitely a sweet, original one.
Did you see this movie? What’s the topic that was the most striking to you? Do you want kids?
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