Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

rating: ****

the story: A depressed man learns his ex deleted all her memories of their relationship, and so he resolves to do the same.

what it's all about: Jim Carrey is one of my favorite actors, and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is one of his most critically acclaimed films.  So why have I struggled with it for fourteen years?

Carrey became famous after making films like Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, The Mask, and Dumb & Dumber.  He transitioned into surrealist comedy with The Truman Show and Man on the Moon, although they could just as easily be described as existentialist.  Eternal Sunshine was the next evolution from that, and he was never able to go further than that, with the closest being The Number 23, where he played someone with memory issues and an identity crisis.  Again, all this because he became uniquely suited to embodying characters well beyond the societal norm, in a mostly humorous fashion. 

Eternal Sunshine presents itself as something of a riddle.  Mindful viewers will know that we begin actually at the end, and then rewind back to the circumstances that immediately preceded it (my summary), and then dive into his memories as they're being erased.  Carrey begins to outrun the erasure, which provides the most amusing elements of the movie.  But ultimately he can't, and his memory is wiped, and...he meets Kate Winslet, again, for the first time, just as we see in the beginning. 

The whole thing becomes a meditation on the stresses of a relationship, and what will or will not, given a few variables, be deal-breakers.  It's kind of (500) Days of Summer before (500) Days of Summer, with a more hopeful, if ambiguous, ending.

So why have I so long had a nagging problem with it?  Well, for one the Jim Carrey who shows up in it, for long stretches at a time, isn't a familiar Jim Carrey at all.  It's not that he's unidentifiable, but that he's so low-key it can be difficult to remember why he was cast.  And then the sequences where he does resemble Jim Carrey...seem out of place. 

Basically, is this a movie that's weird for the sake of being weird?

It feels like someone's idea of what happens if we turn Truman Show up a notch.  Carrey experiences the erasures as if he knows they're happening, and comments on them, and even interacts with the technicians, to a certain extent, while they're working on him.  All this makes for fascinating viewing, but it can also feel artificial, a movie rather than an experience, and yet the whole point of seeing what amounts to an idea of the "real" Carrey, the one who doesn't need to perform all the time, contradicts this.  Charlie Kaufman, the screenwriter known for this kind of material, at least showed restraint previously.  Nicolas Cage talks with himself, Kaufman's imaginary twin brother, throughout Adaptation.  Most of Being John Malkovich is spent with the people using John as a glorified puppet.  The lines are too blurred in Eternal Sunshine. 

That's not to say the individual elements don't work in and of themselves.  The technicians are played by Tom Wilkinson, who leads the team, Mark Ruffalo, Kirsten Dunst, and Elijah Wood.  These are all reliable actors; only Wood is playing against type, which is something he was desperately pursuing in the years following Lord of the Rings.  But he still feels natural.  We learn, eventually, that Dunst once had an affair with Wilkinson, but her memories of it were erased.  Like Ozymandias's supposed brilliant plan in Watchmen, the effects of the erasures aren't as binding as they seem.  If you're attracted to someone, you're attracted to someone. 

The object lesson is the ability to cope rather than hide from heartbreak.  Wilkinson's wife comes closest, briefly though we see her, exasperated though she is, breaking the news to Dunst.  At least she doesn't try to hide from it.  She's the most rational person in the whole movie. 

In the end, I suppose, this is the kind of story that can't have proper resolution, and so it's the ideas that are supposed to be its effect.  It leaves one unsettled because life is messy.  In that regard it's as successful a movie as there ever was.

But darn it, it's still weird not to be satisfied, from a movie starring Jim Carrey.  This is the guy who made a modern Frank Capra (The Majestic).  He may not be downright sappy, but he usually has more concrete things to say, even when exploring the life of a different Kaufman (Andy), who may or may not have faked his own death as his last and greatest prank on the world. 

Oh well, there can always be exceptions.

2007 Capsule Reviews

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
rating: *****
review: One of my all-time favorite movies, Brad Pitt's most unexpected role in a career that to that point had been made of unexpected roles, taking on a quintessential American rebel, with masterful direction from Andrew Dominik and trademark narration from Hugh Ross.

American Gangster
rating: ****
review: I love when two major movie stars collide, which is what happens here between Denzel Washington (the eponymous gangster) and Russell Crowe (who takes on the challenge of bringing him down).  This is Ridley Scott in another of his genre deconstructions.

Ratatouille
rating: ****
review: As close to a true artistic masterpiece as Pixar has gotten, culminating in a divine meditation from Peter O'Toole, the likes of which will probably never be heard again in an animated film.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
rating: ****
review: The final showdown between Dumbledore and Voldemort ought to be considered a master class of fantasy dueling, the most rewarding element of this fifth film in the series.

Gone Baby Gone
rating: ****
review: Ben Affleck began a career revival by directing this Dennis Lehane mystery, starring his brother Casey in one of his defining roles (along with the eponymous Robert Ford above).

Smokin' Aces
rating: ****
review: A truly rollicking experience from Joe Carnahan featuring a bevy of great character performances from the likes of Ben Affleck (yes), Chris Pine, Ryan Reynolds, and even Jeremy Piven as the nominal (and eponymous) lead character.

Across the Universe
rating: ****
review: A visionary exploration of the Beatles catalog with exquisitely reinterpreted arrangements.

No Country for Old Men
rating: ****
review: The Coens go subdued, Josh Brolin solidifies his ascent to A-level, and Javier Bardem delivers an iconic performance as the relentless Anton Chigurh.

The Simpsons Movie
rating: ****
review: It may not feature the delirious music of South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, but this is a perfect representation of the secret heart at the center of The Simpsons.

3:10 to Yuma
rating: ****
review: Crowe does another epic team-up, this time as the villain to Christian Bale's would-be hero in this modern Western.

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
rating: ****
review: It may lack the sheer panache of Dead Man's Chest, but this is a worthy, otherworldly conclusion to the original Pirates trilogy.

The Lookout
rating: ****
review: Joseph Gordon-Levitt's true breakout performance after the splashy attention-getting style of Brick.

I'm Not There
rating: ****
review: Several big names play Bob Dylan in this extrapolation of his legend, including Cate Blanchett, Christian Bale, and Heath Ledger.

Elizabeth: The Golden Age
rating: ****
review: Cate Blanchett's Elizabeth duology reaches epic proportions, the very rare historic drama featuring a woman at the heart of action.

Hot Fuzz
rating: ****
review: Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg, and Nick Frost, the team behind Shaun of the Dead, return in a kind of British Western.

Lucky You
rating: ****
review: Eric Bana bringing humanity to the traditional gambling narrative.

The Number 23
rating: ****
review: Jim Carrey in a mind-bending drama that allows him to lose himself in the narrative rather than stand out in front of it.

Spider-Man 3
rating: ****
review: The traditionally maligned final Sam Raimi/Tobey Maguire/Kirsten Dunst Spider-Man flick is actually narratively its strongest, thanks to at least one of its villains, Thomas Haden Church's Sandman.

Grindhouse
rating: ****
review: A film each from Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Taratino, who both let loose for rollicking adventures.

Charlie Wilson's War
rating: ****
review: Julia Roberts and Tom Hanks explore the mess of the Middle East, from well before 9/11.

Lions for Lambs
rating: ****
review: An ensemble cast including Tom Cruise takes an immersive look at the post-9/11 intellectual landscape.

Juno
rating: ****
review: Ellen Page's perfect role, as a sardonic teen struggling to reconcile her life after becoming pregnant.

The Mist
rating: ****
review: An overlooked horror spectacle from Frank Darabont, once again adapting Stephen King.

In the Valley of Elah
rating: ****
review: Tommy Lee Jones laments the state of the United States post-9/11.

National Treasure: Book of Secrets
rating: ****
review: Arguably better than its predecessor, kind of hard to understand why Nicolas Cage hasn't gotten to make another one.

300
rating: ****
review: Instantly iconic visual spectacle from Zack Snyder and Gerard Butler, from the Frank Miller graphic novel.

Enchanted
rating: ****
review: Thoroughly enchanting live action update of the traditional Disney princess narrative, starring the only actor who could pull it off, Amy Adams.

There Will Be Blood
rating: ***
review: Unbalanced visionary work from Paul Thomas Anderson and Daniel Day-Lewis.

The Hunting Party
rating: ***
review: Fascinating, subdued journey with Richard Gere and Terrence Howard.

Rescue Dawn
rating: ***
review: Harrowing tale of survival from Christian Bale.

Fred Claus
rating: ***
review: Novel Santa tale from Vince Vaughn and Paul Giamatti.

Ocean's Thirteen
rating: ***
review: Breezy final adventure from Danny Ocean's crew.

The Game Plan
rating: ***
review: Goofy family comedy from Dwayne Johnson.

We Own the Night
rating: ***
review: Mark Wahlberg, Joaquin Phoenix, and Eva Mendes in a gritty crime drama.

Michael Clayton
rating: ***
review: George Clooney begins to find his stride as a leading man.

Music and Lyrics
rating: ***
review: Charming romantic comedy from Drew Barrymore and Hugh Grant.

I Am Legend
rating: ***
review: Minimalist survival experience with Will Smith.

Shoot 'Em Up
rating: ***
review: Clive Owen delightfully parodies his own Children of Men.

Freedom Writers
rating: ***
review: Hilary Swank as an inspirational teacher with Patrick Dempsey playing against McDreamy type as her naysaying husband.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
rating: ***
review: Tim Burton and Johnny Depp finding out if their acts work in musical form.

Beowulf
rating: ***
review: Motion-capture version with some sweet vocal performances from Ray Winstone (as the title character), Angelina Jolie, and Anthony Hopkins.

Ghost Rider
rating: ***
review: Nicolas Cage, Eva Mendes and Sam Elliot interpret the Marvel superhero as a kind of modern Western.

License to Wed
rating: ***
review: Robin Williams as a live action supporting actor is clearly still having fun, and so is the kid trying desperately to be just like him.

Shrek the Third
rating: ***
review: The only real misfire in the Shrek series attempts to shift the narrative focus to King Arthur (as voiced by Justin Timberlake).  I always have a hard time remembering what happens in this one.

Bee Movie
rating: ***
review: Jerry Seinfeld disappointingly delivers a fairly traditional animated flick.  But still notable, as it's the only Seinfeld movie appearance to date.

Bucket List
rating: ***
review: Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman popularize the concept of the bucket list.

Alvin and the Chipmunks
rating: ***
review: Lively modern take on the animated critters.

The Bourne Ultimatum
rating: ***
review: The third in the series features Matt Damon learning his secret origin.

Martian Child
rating: ***
review: Charming variation on the classic Harvey narrative, with a kid.

Transformers
rating: ***
review: Bombastic opening salvo of Michael Bay's ultimate cinematic creation.

28 Weeks Later
rating: **
review: If the first one is more memorable, they clearly didn't learn why.

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer
rating: **
review: Serviceable second entry that chose to counterpoint a team that had already failed to fully connect with a lifeless addition.  But at least he's voiced by Laurence Fishburne, and Chris Evans still plays Johnny Storm.

Pathfinder: Legend of the Ghost Warrior
rating: **
review: Karl Urban is asked to anchor this relentless Viking/Native American horror flick.

The Last Legion
rating: **
review: Colin Firth leads an uninspired look back at the Roman Empire.

Blades of Glory
rating: **
review: A rare misfire from Will Ferrell.

Wild Hogs
rating: **
review:  Uncomfortable comedy that seems to come at the expense of John Travolta and Tim Allen.

Good Luck Chuck
rating: **
review: Dane Cook may be a fine standup comedian, but he's not really a leading man in movies.

The Golden Compass
rating: **
review: The Philip Pullman books may desperately want to be the atheist Chronicles of Narnia, but they haven't launched a successful adaptation.

TMNT
rating: **
review: This computer animated Ninja Turtles entry is pretty forgettable.

Fracture
rating: *
review: Ryan Gosling has been heavily pushed by critics for years, but this was an instance where I found the material to fail him.

Avengers: Infinity War - a cultural inquiry

Avengers: Infinity War is on the whole pretty rousing entertainment.  But it's also troubling. 

Black Panther established a precedent of audiences finding sympathetic villains in the Avengers movies.  It drew on Black Lives Matter, and really by drawing on that alone it convinces audiences that the villain wasn't just a villain, but maybe just someone who had the right idea but made bad choices out of it.  Well, no.  That was a convoluted villain with a convoluted connection to Black Lives Matter.

And that's what Thanos in Infinity War represents, too.  Troublingly so.  Thanos is motivated to mass murder in the belief that in reducing the population he can give survivors better opportunities.  This is clearly insane, but audiences are not reacting to this as if it's insane.  Because it's not so far from what a lot of people are arguing in the real world.

When it was Hitler advocating a "master race," it wasn't just pure Germans for a pure Germany he was talking about.  He scapegoated Jews and gypsies and actively set about exterminating them, and if he'd stuck only to that he probably would've had a Germany in a better economic position, which was ostensibly all he wanted.  Thanos may not propound eugenics, but...even Americans were, before WWII.  And there are many movements today that sound equally rational as pre-WWII eugenics.  Politics today has stymied any ability to talk rationally about such issues.  That's what Infinity War is talking about when Iron Man is made aware that the threat of Thanos is more important than whatever might have happened between him and Captain America (as depicted in Captain America: Civil War). 

It's a message that many people watching Infinity War will probably not even think about, because there's still a deep riff in society that neither side seems at all interested in repairing, and no one seems aware is far more trivial than real threats in a real world.  It's worth noting, again, that Hitler was a real threat in a real world, and yet his ideas about eugenics really did exist in pre-WWII America.  The fact that we don't talk about that is almost more troubling than Hitler himself, but not more troubling than the fact that it took so long for Americans to declare war on him, which only happened after the Japanese (note: not Germans) bombed Pearl Harbor.  We had good economic reason to be hesitant, but we were also hesitant to enter WWI, before the Great Depression.  And as it turned out, WWII was very, very good for the economy.  FDR gets a lot of credit for his New Deal ideas, but really, it was WWII that gave Americans new standing, both in the world at large but also at home.  It was turned into politics.  It always turn into partisan politics, despite the fact that such things only ever get everyone into trouble, and often far too long in that trouble to be able to address real problems.

So above everything else, Infinity War is really an attempt at a rallying cry against such nonsense, and that's the best thing about it, and probably the thing that will be least talked about it in the years and decades to come.  And that's what's wrong, and not just with Thanos.

Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

rating: ****

the story: Thanos collects the Infinity Gems and plows through superheroes left and right.

what it's all about: This is it!  This is what these movies have been working toward since Iron Man (2008) when Nick Fury strolls into the movie and talks about an "Avengers initiative."  And "these movies" includes...three Iron Man movies, three Captain America, three Thor, two previous Avengers, two Guardians of the Galaxy, a Doctor Strange, technically one of the Hulk movies, a third cinematic Spider-Man, Black Panther, and an Ant-Man...!  So, lots of material.  And aside from Captain America: Civil War, this is the first time since Avengers that there's been a real sense of momentum, and this is the most momentum these movies could possibly have built up.

And the movie delivers.  It's a perfect summation and justification of the whole thing.  I mean, not perfect.  Where Empire Strikes Back has its big moment at the end people will always point to as reason enough to declare it a classic even though it ends with a cliffhanger...ultimately Infinity War is all cliffhanger.  It's all big moments and clever quips and selling the concept of Thanos as the ultimate threat.  But it features no moment comparable to learning the truth about Vader.  The closest it comes is suggesting Thanos suffers at having to sacrifice his daughter, Gamora, a relationship we already knew about from Guardians of the Galaxy.  And that's ultimately a weakness.  If it were true masterful storytelling, Gamora would stand obviously at the center of Infinity War, but I can tell you the early response is that it's Thanos who does, and that is a weakness.  Thanos is not sympathetic.  He is a villain.  Black Panther introduced the concept of the supposed sympathetic villain.  That's one of the reasons I'm not eager to watch Black Panther, regardless of its rabid popularity, because it trades on responses that manipulate more than tell a credible story.  Infinity War itself sells Black Panther short.  Wakanda is just another in a series of weak superhero defenses.  In order to make Thanos look strong, everyone else has to look weak.  Actually, including Thanos himself.

So I am impressed with the results, and disappointed, too.  The best thing about the movie, because Gamora is held back, is watching all the various aspects of the Avengers movie landscape come together.  All the classic heroes are here, and nearly everyone else, too.  Since I still haven't seen Doctor Strange, this is my first opportunity to see Benedict Cumberbatch as Strange (a brief look from Thor: Ragnarok didn't impress me, and neither did the movie around it).  He comes off well.  I don't tend to like Cumberbatch's American accent, as he seems to be inclined to rob himself of his greatest asset, that deep boom in his voice, when he uses it.  Thankfully he pulls out the boom every now and then.  Zoe Saldana, robbed or not in the story, is the best actor in the movie, as Gamora.  She didn't really have such opportunities in the two Guardians movies to date.  Josh Brolin has been a favorite of mine since he started breaking out in 2007, and while some of his dialogue is clumsy he of course sells Thanos well.  Chris Pratt leads the rest of the Guardians as Star-Lord in typically Star-Lord material.  Chris Hemsworth has the biggest opportunity of the original set to stand out, and maybe because his work in Ragnarok was so recent the movie is inclined to give Thor useful material.  Robert Downey Jr, who has throughout the franchise been at its center, is strangely downplayed, for the first time ever, as Iron Man, despite having some fairly important things to do.  Chris Evans as Captain America has less than both of them but he still comes off as more immediately impactful.  Mark Ruffalo as Hulk (sort of) has strong character material.  Tom Holland's Spider-Man is about as good here as he was in Civil War, and better than he was in his own movie, Spider-Man: Homecoming.  I know Black Panther has been insanely popular, but I remain unmoved by Chadwick Boseman.  Of the many other actors in smaller roles, Peter Dinklage stands out (heh) as a dwarf (heh).  It's about time someone truly looks beyond his size.  And this movie, which like Justice League draws on the 21st century blockbuster legacies of Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, was probably his best bet for such an opportunity.

For the first time, I find the results of an Avengers movie appropriately cinematic.  It's not ultimately just goofing around, but it's also not barreling toward seriousness like Civil War and its predecessor, Captain America: Winter Soldier.  Not that barreling toward seriousness is bad, but that it's always an awkward contrast.  So at least there's material that wants to be taken seriously that doesn't revolve entirely around Captain America. 

The other biggest problem?  The next Avengers movie really has to stick the landing.  If it doesn't, it makes everything else look weak.  Which, as Infinity War points out, is a bad thing.

Sweetwater (2013)

rating: *

the story: A corrupt preacher in New Mexico territory faces judgment day at the hands of a widow and the new lawman.

what it's all about: Lest you think I generally only write about (or watch) movies I like or at least like things about, or have something interesting (in a positive way) about them...I give you Sweetwater.  I thought there would be things to like about it.  I like Ed Harris and Jason Isaacs a great deal.  Until Sweetwater I'd never seen either in something I didn't like.  Well, can't really say that anymore.  This movie is terrible.

These days we tend to talk about "terrible" movies in terms of creative decisions we don't agree with or in questioning their CGI.  But truly bad movies do exist, and I don't mean horribly, horribly incompetent filmmaking that shows up in Mystery Science Theater 3000, but stuff like, well, Sweetwater.  Stuff that's entirely convinced it's just a step or two away from, say, Tarantino or the Coen brothers, as the DVD packaging of Sweetwater suggests.  More like a few steps away from 3000, DVD packaging.  Said packaging also says this was a Sundance film festival selection.  I have no idea how that's even possible.  Maybe I don't know Sundance near well enough.  Maybe it has crap all the time?

But here's the thing.  Here's Sweetwater's Rotten Tomatoes page.  And technically, it features a pretty dismal rating, both from critics and audiences.  But...Take even a brief look at those critics and fans are saying, and I say, they don't seem to understand at all the scope of how terrible Sweetwater is.  They think it's somehow redeemable.  It really, really isn't. 

Let's start with Isaacs' preacher.  The idea is itself cartoonish, more a cult figure from some modern innercity than someone who should be the focus of a movie that's supposed to be taken seriously, some fever dream vision of Christians as they're viewed now than what their role was in the late 1800s, the actual setting of this movie.  And because this is a cartoon Christian, this preacher looks pretty much exactly like Jesus.  It's not that Jason Isaacs gives a bad performance.  He does what he can with the material.  I remember people saying his character in The Patriot was a parody; his Harry Potter work was admittedly designed to leave no doubt about Lucius Malfoy's status.  But they were both still excellent performances, as is his work in Sweetwater.  If there's truly a glimmer of a redemptive possibility, it's Isaacs.

Ed Harris fares worse.  He's the lawman who comes to town.  But he's asked to do bizarre things like dance weirdly for no discernable reason other than the movie thinks it's quirky enough to characterize itself.  But it's as stupid and prurient as the shopkeeper we see spying on women with his pants down.  Otherwise Harris is typically Harris, but I have no idea what possessed him to go along with the idiotic dancing.

The nominal lead is January Jones, best known for Mad Men and X-Men: First Class.  I've been of the suspicious that a lot of what's passed as popular TV entertainment in the past twenty years is actually of the same general quality as Sweetwater, and it's actors like Jones who keep suffering for it.  In Mad Men she was cast as one of the "ironic" babes the guys salivate over "in the era where this was acceptable," "because the show is teaching us a lesson."  But as with X-Men: First Class, as with Sweetwater, she's no doubt there merely to be a pretty face, not because anyone thought for a second whether or not the role suited her talents.  Because Sweetwater has no idea what her talents are, except to eventually have a nude scene for the sake of having a nude scene, and to be silent during her violent revenge.  When critics complain about silent heroines, they're really complaining about stuff like this.  If they complain when the actor fits the rest of the role, they're merely being misogynists, because male actors are silent in actions roles all the time and those same critics don't complain then...

And that about sums up what's wrong with Sweetwater...And what's wrong with people even sort of liking stuff like this?  It's clear admittance that they have no discernable critical ability.  And this is reflected in the popular culture far more often than anyone is prepared to admit.  In sum, this is the sort of thing to be embarrassed about.

Killing Them Softly (2012)

rating: *****

the story: A hitman explains the mechanics of business.

what it's all about: Over the course of only three films, Andrew Dominik has built a strong legacy.  Chopper is an Australian crime drama about a real-life, larger-than-life figure; it gave Eric Bana his first standout performance.  The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford is an elegiac character study about the eponymous event; regardless of the merits of Jesse James himself, Dominik still views it as a tragedy.  Killing Them Softly is his first wholly fictional creation (based on a book called Coogan's Trade, by George V. Higgins), and it's a meditation on a whole system.  By the end of the film, Brad Pitt is stating "America is...just a business."  You will either understand what he's talking about by then, or you won't understand the movie at all.

Killing Them Softly is essentially a mob movie.  It's hardly the first mob movie, but it might just be the first one without any glamor attached to it.  From Jimmy Cagney to Marlon Brando to Ray Liotta, Hollywood movies have tended to glorify mobsters, or at least held them to be inherently fascinating.  Liotta's Goodfellas took it to another level entirely; he's so gleeful and unrepentant about his mobster life he sees anything else as a punishment.  Maybe as viewers we're supposed to see the irony of it, but Martin Scorsese has spent so much time guiding us along from Liotta's perspective, it's hard to see it that way.  Later, mobsters migrated to television, where James Gandolfini ruled The Sopranos with a iron fist; the final scene of the series famously ends without the viewer knowing whether he ever faces justice; this isn't just ambiguity, it's an open invitation to once and for all root for him. 

So to see Gandolfini in Killing Them Softly, indisputably as a ruthless, bad guy mobster, is to finally close a chapter in a very long book.  None of Dominik's movies have been massive successes, and that's an understatement.  For the vast majority of viewers they don't even exist!  Assassination has garnered a cult following over the years, but Killing remains invisible.  It's a shame.  Part of the reason is no doubt because the movie greets Barack Obama's 2008 election as US president with cynicism; this is considered a sin among the minds most likely to care what a movie has to say about something.  The whole movie is about the election; it's as much a framing narrative as Brad Pitt's conversations with Richard Jenkins.  When Pitt concludes, in the final dialogue of the movie, that American is a business, Obama's election is on a TV screen in the background. 

The whole point of the plot is how relationships affect your fate.  Two small-time robbers, including one played by Ben Mendelsohn, are actually the characters we meet first in the movie, and so our sympathies are with them for most of the movie.  We see how they think, and how they attempt to outthink the system, and how they fail even when it seems they don't.  Pitt and Jenkins discuss their predicament; Pitt is hired to take care of it, but he tries to get out of it, because for him, "killing them softly" means killing at a distance.  He doesn't like to get involved unless he has to.  Pitt's acquaintance in Gandolfini, meanwhile, reveals how ugly matters really are, and everything he tries not to be, even though he ultimately can't avoid it.  It's Jenkins who can pretend otherwise, but only because he's basically at the level of the mob Hollywood usually depicts, the one where nothing really seems to be real, just leaving the gun, taking the cannoli. 

Pitt reaches his conclusion because he's tried reconciling things, and it hasn't worked; he still ends up having to become personally involved, and Jenkins tries to pay him less than he's owed, because for Jenkins it's just business, and business usually will try to pay less.  But Pitt understands that what business means is having to take control, because no one else is going to look after you.  It's not how the business functions that matters, and it's not the outcome that matters, either.  It's taking control of your fate.  Liotta, in this movie, loses control of his fate.  He doesn't realize how badly he screwed himself, just as Gandolfini, for all his bluster, doesn't, or Mendelsohn.  It's Pitt who does, because he's ruthless in that business sense, whatever it takes to get ahead. 

Anyway, it's fascinating commentary.

Hell or High Water (2016)

rating: *****

the story: Brothers turn bank robber to pay off their mother's mortgage.

what it's all about: The year it was released I wrote up some thoughts about Hell or High Water here in which I probed its general morality.  Admittedly (and in the thoughts themselves I say so), I hadn't seen it yet.  Now I have seen it a few times, and so I can revisit and talk about the movie itself.

It's a modern classic.  It's a modern classic in much the way No Country for Old Men seemed to be.  I'm still mulling over No Country itself; a lot of what I like about that one is the iconic Javier Bardem performance, as close to a single great acting creation as anything outside of Heath Ledger's Joker we've had since Anthony Hopkins' Hannibal Lecter.  Hell or High Water doesn't have anything like that.  The closest it gets is Ben Foster's breakthrough as Chris Pine's hell-raising brother.  Foster has quietly been growing into a brilliant actor, and nobody seems to have noticed.  He's a lot like Pine, actually.  Where Pine has occasionally created full-on characters (Smokin' Aces, Stretch), Foster has merely inhabited fascinating roles.  Pine is most often in that mode, too, and he found his best to date in this film, so on that score alone Hell or High Water is watching.

It's also well worth watching for Jeff Bridges.  Bridges has been around Hollywood for decades, but I think he's gotten far more interesting as he's aged.  He's certainly been a standout in recent years even among critics.  Crazy Heart earned him a Best Actor Oscar, which he followed with the Coens remake of True Grit.  He's fallen off the radar since then, as his present act has become more familiar, but for me he remains fascinating, and in Hell or High Water he is fascinating.  He's got the same sort of role Tommy Lee Jones had in No Country, but he plays it very differently.  He wouldn't at all be out of place in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. 

Bridges plays an ornery FBI agent days away from retirement.  The role itself is a cliché, but screenwriter Taylor Sheridan writes it with a purpose; the constant offensive ribbing he aims at his partner is metaphorical.  They're in pursuit of Pine and Foster, whose goal is basically to stick it to the man.  They're reacting against a system that seems to have no place for them.  Bridges is trying to put things into perspective.  He tells his partner at one point that it's his teasing that's going to be missed.  His partner reflects about how the banks that are threatening to take away Pine and Foster's childhood home are just the latest in a long series of land seizures.  He would know, because he's part Indian.

The most telling scene, maybe, in the whole movie is inside a casino, where the brothers are laundering their stolen money.  Foster confronts a different Indian, whom Foster has been insulting (you can see the deliberate parallels here).  The Indian has just explained that being a Comanche means everyone's an enemy.  Foster's retort, why the Indian should leave him alone, is, "Because I'm a Comanche."  He sees everyone as his enemy.  That's the key to the whole character.  Years ago he defended his mother against an abusive father.  He ended up in jail because he later killed him (the trial bought it as a hunting accident, inside a barn).  He agrees to go along with his brother's bank robbing scheme mostly because, well, everyone's his enemy already anyway.  He's the crazy one; without him Pine couldn't have done any of it.

In framing it as being about the robberies themselves, that's the wrong interpretation.  The whole story is a metaphor, about how the system has slowly turned against individuals like Pine, like his mother, anyone who can be exploited by a system, really.  We've seen exploitation before, and in hindsight we always condemn it, but it's far harder to do in the present.  We see something like the Great Recession, and we mostly think in terms of economic recovery.  We don't particularly see or care about the lives being crushed because of it, or why.  To its credit, Hollywood hasn't ignored the idea.  Jim Carrey's Fun with Dick and Jane was pretty much the same story, and that was ten years earlier, when the CEO corruption scandals that eventually led to the Great Recession were first coming to light.  The problem is, these movies don't change anything, and they don't even lead to conversations.  This is an era about tough conversations, and yet we keep dodging the toughest ones. 

Pine fears that his actions will forever sully his name.  This fear is derived from the fact that he has growing boys who become the chief beneficiaries of his thefts.  The money for the mortgage is actually so he can reclaim the property and thus lay claim to the oil that's been found beneath it.  The same banks he robbed end up welcoming not only the stolen money, but the oil money, because in the end, money is money.  Bridges figures all of this out.  What he warns Pine is that it's not his reputation that he had to worry about, but his conscience.  Foster ends up killing a few people during the course of events, and Bridges says that's Pine's responsibility; the robberies were his idea, and anything that happened during them or because of them are his fault, too.  Pine will have to live with that. 

Hell or High Water, then, is a cautionary tale.  You can burn down paradise in order to do the right thing, but in the end, it's not satisfaction you've earned but a scorched earth, and that's what you're going to have to live with.  The ends don't always justify the means.  It's a fantasy Western, wish fulfillment in a time when injustice is insidious, systemic, and it doesn't care whether you're white or Indian or any other race.  Sheridan has become one of the hottest commodities in Hollywood, whether as screenwriter or director; David Mackenzie is another director who's gotten to benefit from collaborating with him.  Everything Sheridan creates adds to our understanding of how our world works, and where it needs improving.  But he also issues warnings, and we'd be wise to heed them.