Whiplash

5 Stars

Starring: Miles Teller, J.K. Simmons, Paul Reiser and Melissa Benoist; Written & Directed by Damien Chazelle

J.K Simmons’ powerfully intense performance proves that the parts of a film can overcome their sum whole.

Writer/director Damien Chazelle remakes his own 2013 short as a full length feature, and it’s easy to see that while it’s not his first time behind the lens, it’s certainly tackling a large-scale project, even if it is familiar territory. Every decision he makes with the camera is predictable, from the long one shots, to the rapid cuts, to the shakey-cam, distant angles. It comes across as a comprehensive study in film-making 101. I’m not asking for him to change the game, but it would be nice if he took the training wheels off.

Where Chazelle excels, however, was in his exceptional screenplay. He builds this beautiful Yin-Yang relationship between Teller’s Andrew and Simmons’ Fletcher. Both are incredibly passionate about what they do, and are looking to achieve the same goal, but their approaches counter-act each other which leads to a climactic explosion of drum playing that leads to the exquisitely executed final scene that showcases not only Simmons & Teller’s abilities as actors, but Chazelle’s ability as a filmmaker. It makes the viewer wonder where Chazelle of the last 10 minutes was during the previous 90.

Teller is a difficult actor to pin down. He launched his career with art house flair Rabbit Hole, then ran through the young actor motions of party flick, teen romance, YA future-world. He never presented as the breakout star, but he was definitely entertaining on another level than his fellow cast-mates, and showed a lot of promise. Whiplash is where that promise comes to fruition. He puts a lot of heart into Andrew. You see the drive and determination in his eyes. He masterfully masks the pain of forsaking a personal relationship for his ambitions. He’s soulful at all the right moments.

But Simmons. J.K. Simmons is in another world, on another planet with his brutal and intense performance as Terrance Fletcher, Andrew’s instructor. Simmons plays Fletcher with bi-polar swings from loud, big and angry to soft, reserved and almost friendly. He exudes an air of superiority without coming across as annoyingly arrogant. He truly believes in what he’s doing and that it’s the right way to do it. There’s no hint of smugness, just bull-headed passion. If I had to handicap the Oscars, he’s the runaway leader for Supporting Actor.

Whiplash firmly plants itself as one of the must-see films of the year, despite the aesthetic flaws. A strong script and brilliantly realized performances carry it to one of the top films of the year.

A few years back, I created a few movie centric holidays. I’m a man of no religion, but a huge appreciation for the cinematic arts, so I needed a few high holy days to give me cause for celebration. Back to the Future week happens the week of November 12th, the date of the Enchantment Under the Sea dance. Die Hard Day happens Dec. 24th-25th. Rex Manning Day on May 6th, Dazed & Confused Day on May 28th… a few others. The main conceit of them is offer some personal reflection time, and to relax. Enjoy some music, some good food, the company of friends. You can read about them all in this post from a few years ago.

But today is March 24th. According to opening title cards, today is the day The Breakfast Club spent a whole day in detention, 30 long years ago (thanks to A.V. Club for posting a screen grab). In its genre, the teen flick, it’s certainly one of the best. Not the best, however, American Graffiti, Dazed & Confused and Fast Times at Ridgemont High are certainly superior films. But for almost 30 years, The Breakfast Club has landed with teen audiences in a way few films have. It’s helped many teens navigate the rough seas of high school.

The Breakfast Club takes 5 high school personality archetypes, the geek, the burnout, the jock, the prep and the outcast weirdo, throws them in a giant, library sized blender, and asks them to connect. It’s a completely clichéd narrative device and probably shouldn’t, by any rights, have the iconic status it has. But a masterful script from 80s teen flick guru John Hughes only uses the clichés as a mechanism to not make us identify with one character, but with all of the characters.

Over the course of the film, all of what we assume we know about the characters are slowly scraped away and picked apart till we grow to have a better understanding of who they are, and why they are who they are. Andy Clark isn’t just some dumb meat head jock. Johnny Bender isn’t just a disinterested burnout. Claire Standish isn’t just an above it all priss. They’re all going through a struggle. They’re all fighting a battle. And that’s what we, as the audience, identified with. We’ve got a struggle we’re trying to get through at that age. Knowing that everyone does too makes it that much easier to take.

I love that the film explores more realistic outcomes of their day together. It asks the question, “We’re friends right here, right now… but what about Monday?” And we get a beautifully honest answer: Probably not. Brian and Allison might hang out. But everyone’s going to go their separate ways. They kind of blew that up by pairing everyone, except Brian, off in the closing moments, but we still get the sense that that was fleeting romance. And while deep down we know that things will probably go back to status quo once the bell rings on Monday morning, we also know that Alison, Andy, Brian, Claire and John all experienced some personal growth, and that they are different, better people because of that shared experience. That gives us, the viewer, the hope that we will emerge on the other side of our struggles as different, better people.

So while the aforementioned films from Amy Heckerling, George Lucas and Richard Linklater are decidedly better films, the reason Hughes’ Breakfast Club has created such a lasting impression is that it connects the characters to each other, and to the audience, in a way that we as audiences need at the time we see it (preferably in high school… the film kind of has a shelf-life of relevancy).

Breakfast Club Day, like the movie, is about acknowledging the differences we have with the people we interact with on a daily basis, but recognizing how similar we all actually are, and how we can use both the similarities and differences to better understand one another.

Happy Breakfast Club Day, everybody!

300: Rise of an Empire

1 star

Starring Eva Green, Sullivan Stapleton, Lena Heady; Directed by Noam Murro; Written by Zack Snyder and Kurt Johnstad

I liked the first 300. I liked the visual style, I liked the “campfire tale” aspect of the storytelling, the violent action was entertaining. But I was always wary of a sequel. It didn’t really warrant one, and director Zack Snyder’s unique sense of visualization doesn’t lend itself to duplication. Do I really care what else may have been going on at the same time, what other Greek armies were doing as the Persians were attacking? Turns out no.

There’s a lot of steely glares between Themistocles (Stapleton) and Artemisia (Green), between Themistocles and Queen Gorgo (Heady), between… Themistocles and Random Athenian Soldier #3. And these are in place of exciting action sequences. What action sequences and fight scenes there are, are too quick to really get us into it, even at the trademarked “Slowed Down/Sped Up” pace.

Director Noam Murro’s only cinematic credit was indie comedy Smart People from 2008, and he didn’t handle the transition to big budget action spectacle too well. It felt like someone trying to be Zack Snyder, than trying to do his own thing with an existing property. Granted Snyder’s stock has significantly risen now that he has Superman under his belt, so he wouldn’t be available to come back to helm this new entry into the 300 franchise.

That just compounded the fact that it felt forced. The graphic novel this is supposed to be based upon isn’t even out yet, as Frank Miller is still working on his followup to 300, Xerxes. I’m having a tough time finding a rational reason this film was produced, other than as a money grab, obviously.

The only aspect that kept my interest was my fascination with Eva Green. She’s a great actress and can usually turn a tolerable performance from a sub-par script, which she kinda does. But with so much working against her, it’s hard to get behind her.

I can’t think of any reason to watch this flick, maybe if you’re bored and there’s nothing else on TV at the time, but I left the theatre feeling like my time and money had been wasted.

The Purge

2 stars

Starring Ethan Hawke and Lena Headey

Written and Directed by James DeMonaco

When trying to create some sort of social or political commentary through art, be it canvas, the written word, song or cinema, it’s important to make sure that, by completion, you’ve actually said something. It ultimately doesn’t matter how well you tell your story, because once you cross into “this is a metaphor for something” territory, if there isn’t a metaphor, your story is hollow.

Such is the problem with James DeMonaco’s lofty goal film The Purge. He posits the ideal that crime, unemployment, poverty, all the bad stuff, would be reduced to almost zero, if we allowed all crime to be legal for a 12 hour period. It’s a premise that doesn’t make sense on paper, but is just weird enough that you’re intrigued enough to allow the line of questioning, on the condition that it goes somewhere, or says something, interesting. But it doesn’t. There’s no logical explanation as to why this works, aside from the false notion that all human beings are evil at heart, and bottling it up makes the world a terrible place, ergo, let people kill, maim, destroy with no repercussion, and all problems solved. There’s no big philosophical or psychological reveal that really challenges you to think.

While watching the film, and on the drive home afterwards, I was reminded of two films, both in the same, or a similar, genre. Both exquisitely saying what I think The Purge was trying say. The first being Wes Craven’s 1972 thriller classic The Last House on the Left (which was superbly remade in 2009). We’re given two groups of people: the vile gang of murderers and rapists, and the good clean-cut family. And it’s the good clean-cut family that goes on a murderous rampage throughout the film, getting rid of the “bad guys.” Everybody is capable of bad, of evil. We’re presented with traditional hero/villain archetypes, and while we root for the hero, they’re doing sadistic, villainous acts, and it becomes hard to root for them.

The second film was the 2002 British zombie flick 28 Days Later… (one of my all time favourite films) from Danny Boyle. It, too, blurred the line between hero and monster, when Jim goes on his rampage through the mansion, methodically taking out the soldiers. He was running on pure rage, despite not being infected with rage.

That’s the lesson it appears DeMonaco was trying to teach. That we’re all a little evil, and it’s good to vent that. But throughout the movie, the heroes did good things, the villains did bad things, and no lessons were learned by anyone. On or off-screen.

So I have to ask? What were you trying to say, and why didn’t you say it?

It wasn’t a total loss. Taken in as just a straight home-invasion thriller, it’s effective, you’re engaged throughout. Ethan Hawke and Lena Headey anchor a cast of otherwise unknowns, and do so capably. But with a broached subject matter that never gets fleshed out, it feels ultimately hollow.

You can skip this in theatres… probably on Netflix or Redbox as well. Maybe in a few years you’re going to be up late one night, and catch it at 2 am on TNT or USA, and with nothing better to watch than reruns of The Office you’ve already seen 200 times, you’ll say “Meh… Brodie said this would happen, so I might as well.”