Band Aid

There are few things as musically authentic as a garage band..

(2017) Comedy (IFC) Zoe Lister-Jones, Adam Pally, Fred Armisen, Susie Essman, Retta, Hannah Simone, Ravi Patel, Brooklyn Decker, Angelique Cabral, Majandra Delfino, Nelson Franklin, Kailash Banerjee Sukhadia, Vivien Lyre Blair, Colin Hanks, Chris D’Elia, Daryl Wein, Jamie Chung, Erinn Hayes, Jesse Williams, Gillian Zinser. Directed by Zoe Lister-Jones

 

Marriages are complex, fragile things that can sometimes be torn apart by the slightest of difficulties. We take it for granted that married couples will argue, sometimes in toxic ways. Relationship experts tell us that arguments are a healthy thing for couples. Experience tells us that they can also signify the beginning of the end.

All Anna (Lister-Jones) and Ben (Pally) seem to do is argue. The arguments are generated by life’s little annoyances – like a chronically full sink of dirty dishes and a leaky faucet that never gets fixed –  and often lead to big underlying issues. Both of these 20-somethings are suffering from failed expectations; Anna once had a book deal that fell through and now she’s an Uber driver. Ben, a talented artist, designs corporate logos when he can actually get his butt off the couch. There are moments that it’s clear that the two still love each other but those moments are becoming increasingly infrequent.

One early hint that things are terribly wrong between them is that when they are invited to a child’s birthday party, Anna has to get really high just to make it through the party for reasons that become clear later in the film. While she is blissed out, she and Ben give an impromptu rock concert on children’s instruments. Later that night, Anna hits on the idea of starting a band – and using their arguments as inspiration for songs.

Considering that their relationship counselor is moving to Canada (quite possibly to get away from the two of them), it seems like all the therapy they can afford. They locate their dusty guitar and bass and start searching for a drummer; they find one in Dave (Armisen), a neighbor and recovering sex addict who probably couldn’t be more creepy if the writer’s tried (and they did).

They play a couple of gigs and they aren’t half bad. In fact, they’re pretty good. Best of all, the impromptu therapy seems to be working; Anna and Ben are arguing less and the dishes are getting done. They seem to be more kind towards each other. A potential record deal is in the offing. Life couldn’t be rosier.

Then they have the mother of all arguments and at last some of their underlying issues begin to surface. Anna throws Ben out and he shacks up with Dave for a bit before running home to Mama (Essman). But there were things said that can’t be un-said. Can their relationship survive? Should it?

There’s a lot to like here. Lister-Jones, more familiar to viewers through her television work including her most recent stint on the CBS sitcom Life in Pieces, proves to be a promising director. She’s no Sofia Coppola – yet – but she has the wisdom to keep her touch light and the skill to pull it off. She also has a ton of chemistry with Pally; the two make a cute couple, too cute upon occasion but always believable. Their arguments hit the right notes and sound pretty authentic to these married ears.

The dialogue is hipster 101 in some ways; everyone talks like they’re in a sitcom pulling off snarky one-liners. The trouble is, I know a lot of people who talk exactly like Ben and Anna and it’s even more annoying in real life. Some people are also not going to be able to get past that both Ben but especially Anna use drugs heavily t get through the pain and have both become somewhat caught in a very deep rut. Go-getters might have trouble with the couple, as those who have issues with hipsters might.

Still, the movie is surprisingly insightful – the conversation between Ben and his Mom near the end on the nature of women had a lot to say and makes the whole movie worth it right there. I was also fond of the dirty dishes as a metaphor for the relationship; the dishes just stood there stagnant in a pile with the couple just piling new dishes on until one of them thinks to clear out the dishes from the sink. So it is with relationships (and Ben and Anna’s in particular); all the negative stuff gets piled on in the relationship and the heap just gets larger and larger until one of them decides to let go of the negatives.

The tone is pretty light and I liked that the humor which was pretty skewed in places kept things from getting too depressing, but some of the humor is a bit cruel and snarky; if you don’t like those sorts of jokes this movie might not be for you. Do look for the cameos of Uber passengers in Anna’s car. This isn’t going to be top ten material for the year but it is a breezy and engaging film that has a surprising amount of depth at its core. Definitely check this one out!

REASONS TO GO: There are a surprising amount of insights, particularly later on in the movie. The music is pretty decent and surprisingly varied..
REASONS TO STAY: The dialogue is almost unbearably hipster-friendly.
FAMILY VALUES: There is more than a little drug use, plenty of profanity, some brief nudity and sexuality.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Decker, Delfino and Lister-Jones all star in the TV show Friends with Better Lives.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 6/27/17: Rotten Tomatoes: 85% positive reviews. Metacritic: 67/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Inside Llewyn Davis
FINAL RATING: 7.5/10
NEXT: Past Life

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Manchester by the Sea

Grief is an emotion best shared.

(2016) Drama (Roadside Attractions/Amazon) Casey Affleck, Lucas Hedges, Michelle Williams, Kyle Chandler, C.J. Wilson, Josh Hamilton, Tate Donovan, Jami Tennille Mingo, Anna Baryshnikov, Liam McNeill, Gretchen Mol, Kara Hayward, Joe Stapleton, Brian Chamberlain, Christian Mallen, Oscar Wahlberg, Ruibo Qian, Tom Kemp, Chloe Dixon, Matthew Broderick, Quincy Tyler Bernstine. Directed by Kenneth Lonergan

 

Joseph Conrad famously wrote that “that which does not kill us makes us stronger” but like all aphorisms, it isn’t always true. There are some things, some horrible terrible things, that may not necessarily kill us but they destroy us emotionally, mentally and spiritually. They turn us into the living dead, unable to recover, unable to die.

Lee Chandler (Affleck) is someone like that. He works as a handyman/janitor in several apartment buildings in Quincy, Massachusetts, taken for granted and overlooked – and quite happy in that circumstance. He’s good at what he does, but when he gets guff from the tenants he tends to give it right back. He hangs out in bars, ignoring the come-ons of attractive women and then getting into meaningless bar fights, exploding over the slightest provocation.

His routine is disrupted with the news that his big brother Joe (Chandler) has died suddenly. Joe has had heart problems for years so it isn’t completely unexpected but it is still a devastating blow. Both brothers are divorced but Joe does have a son Patrick (Hedges) that lives with him since it turns out that his mom (Mol) is a raging alcoholic. Lee for whatever reason has been unable to forgive her for this. Lee goes back to Manchester-by-the-sea, a North Shore town where he grew up but he has left for good reason.

To Lee’s dismay, it turns out that Joe in his will named Lee as Patrick’s guardian. It also turns out that Joe has left enough money that will assist Lee in paying for things that Patrick will need. Lee has no intention of taking care of Patrick in Manchester – he wants Patrick to finish out the school year and then live with him in Quincy until he goes to college but Patrick balks. His whole life is there in Manchester – two girlfriends and a truly bad garage band – but he doesn’t want to start over, particularly with his Uncle who is taciturn, grim-faced and possessed of an explosive temper that gets him into trouble.

Lee’s ex-wife Randi (Williams) is seeing someone else but seems eager to re-connect with Lee, which Lee seems absolutely against. There are those in town who seem to have some sort of issue with Lee as well; most seem to shy away from him, as if he’s a bomb with a hair trigger. Bit by bit, we discover why Lee has these walls up…but can anything bring them down?

Most Hollywood movies dealing with a broken man (and Lee Chandler is most assuredly broken) who is forced unwillingly to become responsible for a child (although Patrick is 16 years old) usually end up with the broken man being fixed by the experience. Manchester by the Sea is a refreshing change from that trope as Lee is changed, but not fixed. The pain he is in is still there when the movie ends, and it is clear that pain will always be with him – and understandably so. What he has to live with is not something that people can just fix and forget.

Affleck, who in many ways has always been in the shadows of his brother Ben, has emerged with this performance. Oh sure, we always knew he could act – Gone Baby Gone and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and several other examples are proof of that. Here though he is an odds on favorite to win the Best Actor Oscar and is a lock to get at least a nomination. This is the kind of performance that sears the soul of the viewer and stays there; it is a performance one can view again and again and still find something fresh and new about it. It is the step one takes from being a good actor to being a great one, and it is worth celebrating – we can always use great actors and Casey Affleck has become one.

Much of the movie is concerned with grief and how different people experience it. One point that Lonergan makes is that no matter how together someone seems on the surface, eventually that pain must manifest itself in some way or another, either through tears or walls or both. There are several scenes – a late film encounter between Lee and his ex, the moment when Patrick finally breaks down, the aftermath of a tragedy – that are as important as any you’ll see in a movie this year, or any other for that matter.

This is a movie firmly entrenched in working class values. Hollywood has a tendency to either mythologize those values, or condescend towards them. Lonergan does neither; he simply presents them as he sees them and allows the audience to draw their own conclusions. He doesn’t shy away from allowing people to think either; there are a lot of concepts here worthy of post-movie discussion and while it can be a hard movie to sit through, it is rewarding because of that reason. The subject matter is heavy and Lonergan refuses to take short cuts or dumb things down.

I know a lot of people mistrust Hollywood as a bastion of liberal elitism and there’s some justification for that. Those people who feel that way should see this movie. It is a celebration of life in the midst of pain and death. It doesn’t shy away from the realities of life but it doesn’t wallow in them either. It finds the quiet bravery of just getting up in the morning without making a fuss about it. In short, this is one of the best movies of 2016 and one which you should make every effort to see.

REASONS TO GO: A show-stopping performance by Casey Affleck is one of the best of the year. Grief is looked at in an honest and realistic way. The attitude is completely working class in a good way. This film doesn’t dumb itself down for its audience.
REASONS TO STAY: The pacing is a little bit on the slow side.
FAMILY VALUES: There is plenty of foul language, some sexual situations and adult themes.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: The project was originally intended for Matt Damon to direct and star in, but conflicts with The Martian forced him to withdraw.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 12/29/16: Rotten Tomatoes: 97% positive reviews. Metacritic: 96/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Angels Crest
FINAL RATING: 10/10
NEXT: Vacancy

Deathgasm

Kimberly Crossman sure can axe.

(2015) Horror Comedy (Dark Sky) Milo Cawthorne, Kimberly Crossman, James Blake, Sam Berkley, Daniel Cresswell, Delaney Tabron, Stephen Ure, Colin Moy, Jodie Rimmer, Nick Hoskins-Smith, Erroll Shand, Kate Elliott, Aaron McGregor, Andrew Laing, Tim Foley, Cameron Rhodes. Directed by Jason Lei Howden

There are some things that just shouldn’t be messed with. Horror movies have taught us that. The unknown can be pretty terrifying. Of course, teenage boys were born to mess with things that shouldn’t be messed with. Horror movies have also taught us that.

Brodie (Cawthorne) is a lonely outcast. His mom, a drug addict, is in rehab and he’s currently living in a small New Zealand town with his Uncle Albert (Moy) and cousin David (Hoskins-Smith) who likes nothing better than to bully Brodie. Brodie gets his solace through heavy metal, which makes him feel better because he believes that it’s proof that someone else feels his rage and pain. To the Christian household that Albert and his wife Mary (Rimmer) runs, this isn’t welcome news.

Brodie latches on to the two people in school who are even more pathetic than he – Giles (Cresswell) and Dion (Berkley) who are Dungeons and Dragons addicts. Brodie pines for the beautiful Medina (Crossman) but she seems to be taken – by David, so even breathing the same air as her will get him beat up. Even more lonely than ever, Brodie wanders into the only record store in town where he meets Zakk (Blake), the only other metalhead in town and who doubles as the town delinquent.

The only thing to do is to form a band, so together with Giles and Dion the metal band DEATHGASM is born (in exactly that punctuation because as Zakk puts it, “lower case is for pussies”). The two are delighted to discover that Rikki Daggers (Ure), frontman for the legendary Haxansword – a cult metal band they both worship – lives in that very town.

Zakk being Zakk, decides to see what he can steal from Rikki’s house. It turns out that Rikki is home and is holding on to a lost Haxansword album and inside the album is some sheet music. When a Satanist thug breaks into the house to steal the same thing, Rikki gives the album to the kids and tells them to guard it with their lives.

Of course, they ignore the satanic symbols all over the music and decide to play it and when they do, they unleash a horror as a demon called The Blind One is conjured and most of the town is clawing out their eyes to escape the dreadful visions and vomiting up blood. It will be up to the metalheads to save the world but how can they when Zakk and Brodie are flipping out because they both want the same girl, Medina, who has become a metalhead herself after Brodie introduced her to the music. Rock on.

New Zealand, which in the 80s gave us some pretty nifty horror flicks (some from the great Peter Jackson) is rapidly becoming the center for horror movies with a funny edge. What We Do in the Shadows and Housebound have been a couple of Kiwi scarefests that have impressed fans and critics alike in the last few years.

Add this one to the list. From WETA wizard and first-time director Howden comes this irreverent look at the symbiosis between metal and horror and it works. It helps that Cawthorne is a handsome, appealing lad who has a surprising screen presence that hints at a promising future. Yeah, Brodie can be a bit of a schlub now and again but as the movie wears on he becomes a pretty competent horror film hero. Not all of the cast is as successful as he is however; a few of the actors here are a bit wooden.

The music is for the most part not too bad; it’s not super-hardcore so non-metal fans won’t be put off although hardcore fans might find it a bit tame. The humor here is edgy and fun, and there’s enough gore to keep any horror freak happy as a pig in…well, you know.

In many ways, this is a throwback to the horror films of the 80s which is a good thing; it’s not afraid to be bloody, the humor and gore can be over-the-top (perhaps too much so for some) and you’re not required to think overly much. This is the kind of mindless fun that is typical for New Zealand horror; it doesn’t take itself too seriously but at the same time it takes itself seriously enough, if you get my drift. This isn’t breaking any new ground but to be honest, there’s no law requiring it to. It’s the kind of thing you can watch either in your local movie theater (check the website for locations) or on VOD on a cool autumn night and bliss out to the Halloween horror film goodness.

REASONS TO GO: Cheeky sense of humor. Metalhead gore fan nirvana.  Cawthorne an appealing lead.
REASONS TO STAY: Has a been there done that feel. Some of the performances not quite up to snuff. May be too over-the-top for some.
FAMILY VALUES: A pretty sizable amount of gore, plenty of foul language, some sexuality and drug use, some disturbing images and terror.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: The movie’s theme song was performed by the New Zealand band Bulletbelt. Howden sang backing vocals on the track.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 10/2/15: Rotten Tomatoes: 85% positive reviews. Metacritic: 65/100.
BEYOND THEATERS: VOD (Check your local cable/satellite provider), iTunes
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Trick or Treat
FINAL RATING: 6.5/10
NEXT: Shout Gladi Gladi

The Rocker

Rainn Wilson forgot his earplugs.

(20^th Century Fox) Rainn Wilson, Christina Appelgate, Josh Gad, Teddy Geiger, Jane Lynch, Emma Stone, Jason Sudeikis, Howard Hesseman, Jeff Garlin, Bradley Cooper, Will Arnett, Fred Armison. Directed by Peter Cattaneo

Dreams can carry us through our worst moments, but they can also be responsible for those worst moments, turning on us savagely and striking with the lethal efficiency of a cobra. That’s particularly true of rock and roll dreams.

Robert “Fish” Fishman (Wilson) had the ultimate rock and roll dream in his fingertips. His band, Vesuvius, was about to be signed by Matchbox Records midway through the ‘80s heyday of heavy metal, with all the AquaNet, headbands and spandex that implies. There was an unfortunate caveat to the deal, however – the nephew of a record company executive was to be inserted in the drum kit and Fish was left high and dry.

He never really recovered from it. Unable to maintain a relationship, barely able to retain a job for very long, he is reduced to living in his sister Lisa’s (Lynch) attic. Let us just say Lisa isn’t terribly sympathetic to her brother’s plight.

Her son Matt (Gad) is, however; he has a garage band with high school friends Curtis (Geiger) and Amelia (Stone) and they need a drummer for their gig at the high school prom. Fish is recruited and being a bit of a nitwit, resumes his role as a hard-drinking, rebellious rock and roller, arriving at the prom gig minutes before they’re to go onstage (“Headliners go on at 11,” he explains while Amelia replies laconically “It’s a prom; it’s over by 11”).

Fish is his own worst enemy, bringing the prom to a screeching halt with an ill-advised drum solo. He vows to make it up to his bandmates by getting them a real club gig which he does, in Indiana (the band lives in Cleveland) but neglects to ask his sister if he can borrow her van, ending up getting pulled over by the cops before they reach the state line.

A video of Fish practicing naked, however, surfaces on the Internet, leading to a buzz about “the Naked Drummer” which in turn gets the garage band (who is charmingly known as A.D.D.) noticed by none other than Matchbox Records, the same label as Vesuvius. A.D.D goes on the road, which after Fish gets them arrested for trashing a hotel room, includes Curtis’ mom Kim (Applegate) as chaperone. Is there a romance budding within the band? Will they finally get the rock stardom Fish has been waiting for two decades for? Will they blow Fish’s old band Vesuvius off the stage?

Cattaneo (The Full Monty) doesn’t seem to know whether he’s making a broad satire or a gentle sitcom-like comedy. At times, the humor is out there (as when an enraged Fish chases down his old bandmates in a moving van) and at times it’s somewhat pedantic. Even Wilson, who is best known for his work in “The Office,” doesn’t seem to know at all times who his character is.

It’s a shame because there certainly was a good movie to be had here. The music is surprisingly good, and Geiger, a real-life pop star who previously had some exposure on the short-lived NBC series “Love Monkey,” is an engaging presence who is given some pretty good material to sing. Stone, who recently gained some positive attention for her work in Easy A is sweet and acid at the same time in her role of Amelia, making her a cross between a schoolgirl and a confident rocker. Gad channels Jonah Hill somewhat, albeit on a lower key, is solid as a socially challenged overweight keyboardist.

The supporting cast is surprisingly strong, with Garlin as Fish’s hero-worshipping brother-in-law, Cooper, Armison and Arnette as his ex-bandmates in Vesuvius, Hesseman as a drug-addled bus driver and Sudeikis as a slimy record label exec. There are also cameos from Demitri Martin, Aziz Ansari and Jane Krakowski. In other words, there was plenty of talent in front of the camera.

Unfortunately the movie never really lives up to its potential, with the jokes being of the hit-or-miss variety. What The Rocker ends up being is an odd cross between This is Spinal Tap and School of Rock minus the biting satire and Jack Black (who in my estimation would have been a better choice of leads than Wilson). It is essentially harmless entertainment, which would seem to be the antithesis of what rock and roll is supposed to be.

WHY RENT THIS: Truthfully there is some heart here. The music and Teddy Geiger’s singing is faultless.

WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: The filmmakers were a bit schizophrenic in what kind of movie they wanted to make. Much of the humor falls flat.

FAMILY VALUES: There’s some male rear end nudity (not for the squeamish), a little bit of language and a few drug and sexual references, mostly pretty mild. In other words, probably safe for most teens and mature tweens.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Former Beatle Pete Best, who’s story this is loosely based on, makes a cameo early on in the movie reading a Rolling Stone with Vesuvius on the cover; true to form, most of his work ended up on the cutting room floor.

NOTABLE DVD EXTRAS: For a movie that did poorly at the box office, there are plenty of extras on the Born to Rock special editions of both the DVD and Blu-Ray variety. There is a VH-1 Behind the Music-style documentary on Vesuvius, a music video for “I’m Not Bitter,” two separate gag reels, a featurette on the cast and crew members talking about their favorite concerts, and a kind of a one-joke clip in which most of the cast members ask if they can be in “The Office.”

BOX OFFICE PERFORMANCE: $8.8M on a $15M production budget; the movie was a flop.

FINAL RATING: 6/10

TOMORROW: The Six Days of Darkness begins with Let Me In