Church & State

Utah: democracy or theocracy?

(2018) Documentary (Blue Fox/Breaking Glass) Mark Lawrence, Peggy Tomsic, Steve Urquhart, Jim Magleby, Jennifer Dobner, Derek Kitchen, Moudi Sbeity, Kody Partridge, Laura Wood, Bob Evans, David Knowlton, Kate Call, Kate Kendell, Missy Larsson. Directed by Holly Tuckett and Kendall Wilcox

 

In 2015, same-sex marriage was made legal throughout the United States, ending a fight which had been escalating over the past…well, going back to the Stonewall Riots. It marked a sea change in American attitudes towards its LGBTQ citizens as popular support for the cause grew.

One of the first salvos fired in the battle for marriage equality took place in Utah. Amendment 3, which had been approved by 66% of the predominantly Mormon voters and approved by the Church of Latter-Day Saints itself (albeit only tacitly). Mark Lawrence, a middle-aged gay man who had moved to Utah from San Francisco to care for his ailing father, had always regretted not marching for AIDS when he lived in the Bay Area in the 80s. He felt moved to do something about what he considered a morally objectionable law – and thought that if he sued the State of Utah, he would have a reasonable chance of winning on constitutional law grounds.

But nobody wanted to help him do it. Inexperienced in activism and fundraising, he founded the group Restore Our Humanity for the purpose of fundraising for the lawsuit, and set out to find someone to help set it up. He was met by stony resistance from all of the national organizations he contacted; most felt that in a state as red as Utah there was absolutely no chance they could get the law overturned. At last, he found a small law firm who was willing to take on the case, and a lawyer named Peggy Tomsic who was willing to take it on – which meant not only taking on the State of Utah but by extension, the Church of Latter-Day Saints as well (the film takes the stance that the Mormons largely control the state from a political angle – many of the state legislators are Mormons, so they do have a case).

It would turn out to be one of the first cases to be tried in a federal court on the subject of same-sex marriage and the State of Utah, feeling that they not only had the will of the people behind them but also the full force of the law, were unprepared when the judge ruled in favor of the plaintiffs; they were so confident in their chances that they did not have a Stay of implementation writ ready to go on, which is common practice in suits like this. Seventeen days would go by with hundreds of same-sex couples receiving marriage licenses before a stay was finally filed.

But the fight was only beginning. There was an appeal to be filed and there would be in-fighting between the legal team, the plaintiffs (which couldn’t be Lawrence since he wasn’t in a relationship at the time) and Lawrence, who eventually dissolved the organization he founded to fight Amendment 3 and said disconsolately afterwards “If I had to do it all again? I probably wouldn’t have.”

The filmmakers tell the story of the lawsuit pretty well. There is a good deal of archival footage, promotional footage from the Church of Latter-Day Saints (they declined all interview requests they received from the filmmakers) and talking head interviews. Some of the footage is chilling, such as the Mormon elder who gives his approval to someone beating up a gay man, or the repeated insistence that they have nothing against gay people and that it’s not personal, but…y’all are perverts and you need to get out of Salt Lake, pretty much.

This is very much an underdog story and it is viscerally pleasing from that point of view. Lawrence is an interesting enough subject but he can be abrasive and the filmmakers shift their focus from him to lawyer Peggy Tomsic who as a lesbian definitely had skin in the game; she had a long-time partner and the two of them were caring for a small boy that they couldn’t legally adopt because of their marital status (or lack thereof) and were well-aware that he could be snatched away from them at any moment. Her story really shows the casual cruelty, the true evil, of the stance that those proponents of the gay marriage ban took. As Tomsic says, as much as they claim it is about the welfare of the children, at the end of the day it is not because keeping kids out of a stable home with two parents benefits nobody.

The story is a fascinating one, but it is a very locally-oriented one and the documentaries that focused on the fight for marital equality on a national level will probably hold more interest. However, for those looking to dive deeper on how that came to happen against what some thought were nearly insurmountable odds, could find this worth a look.

REASONS TO SEE: Concise storytelling.
REASONS TO AVOID: Territory covered on the national level more effectively.
FAMILY VALUES: There are some adult themes and some profanity.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: The film was a Special Jury Award winner at the 2018 American Documentary Film Festival.
BEYOND THE THEATER: Amazon, AppleTV, Hoopla, Vudu
CRITICAL MASS: As of 1/22/20: Rotten Tomatoes: No score yet: Metacritic: No score yet.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: The Case Against 8
FINAL RATING: 6.5/10
NEXT: The Happy Prince

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Hereditary

Toni Collette practices her Oscar acceptance speech.

(2018) Horror (A24) Toni Collette, Gabriel Byrne, Alex Wolff, Milly Shapiro, Christy Summerhays, Morgan Lund, Mallory Bechtel, Jake Brown, Harrison Nell, Briann Rachele, Heidi Mendez, Moises Tovar, Jarrod Phillips, Ann Dowd, Brock McKinney, Zachary Arthur, David Stanley, Bus Riley, Austin Grant, Gabe Eckert, Jason Miyagi, Marilyn Miller, Rachelle Hardy, Georgia Puckett  Directed by Ari Aster

There are critics who shouldn’t be allowed to review some genres. Those who abhor emotional manipulation should not be allowed to review romantic comedies. Those who think movies exist only to illuminate and educate shouldn’t be allowed to review Hong Kong action films or superhero films for that matter. There are some who don’t have the patience for kid flicks. and there are plenty of critics who don’t get horror movies at all who should be kept away from horror movies with physical restraints – and I suspect some of them would be just fine with that. Me, I love horror movies so at least you won’t get genre snobbery below.

\Annie Graham (Collette) is burying her recently deceased mother. She is strangely ambivalent about it; her relationship with her mom was strained to say the least. In fact, the only member of the family who is sorry to see the old lady go is the youngest, daughter Charlie (Shapiro) who is as creepy a child as you’re likely to find on any movie screen, theatrical or home.

Annie has kind of a strange job; she’s an artist who builds miniature rooms with meticulous detail. These rooms are largely from her own past and present. Annie is already kind of a high strung sort much to the chagrin of her stoner teenage son Peter (Wolff) and grounded husband Steve (Byrne). When a second tragedy strikes the family, it threatens to send Annie over the edge.

Reluctantly, she attends a grief-counseling group where she runs into Joan (Dowd), a motherly sort who has lost her husband and son to a car accident. She confides in an increasingly depressed Annie that she has discovered a means of communicating with the dead. Given a straw to cling to, Annie seizes it with both hands but as anyone who knows anything about the horror genre knows, it’s never a good idea to contact the dead.

Now, the synopsis above makes this sound like a pretty run-of-the-mill horror concoction but I assure you that it is not. This is one of the most justifiably acclaimed horror movies of this year or maybe even any other year, both by critics who do get horror films and fans of the genre alike (not to mention film buffs and cinephiles). The movie is ingeniously crafted, a slow burn that builds to an absolutely twisted finale that will leave you terrified of turning out the lights for days.

One of the reasons to love this movie is Toni Collette. Horror films rarely generate Oscars for actors but this is one that truly deserves to. Collette’s depiction of Anne’s descent into paranoid madness is the stuff of horror rubbernecking – you simply can’t turn away. Collette has been nominated for Oscars before but this may well be her best performance. I can’t imagine anyone topping it. The rest of the performances are strong, particularly the always-reliable Byrne, the up-and-coming star Wolff and veteran character actor Dowd. Shapiro is also particularly strong but she doesn’t get as much screen time as the others.

Steve Newburn is credited with designing the miniatures; they are exquisite and add considerably to the creepy factor So too does the score which doesn’t take cheap shots with ersatz scares. When the really scary stuff starts to unfold, it’s honest and quite frankly, this movie is scary as fcuk. Seriously, if you are easily frightened or overly sensitive this movie may well be too much for you.

This is not the kind of movie that throws jump scares at you to keep you off-balance. This is a slow-building ticking time bomb that immerses you in an atmosphere that is both normal and not-quite-right. As things begin to go off the rails for Annie, we begin to understand she’s not the most reliable of narrators. Is it really happening? I say yes. Whether you’re on the same page as I am, this is certainly one of the most unforgettable horror movies of the past decade and if you didn’t see it during its brief run this past summer, you NEED to see it this Halloween.

REASONS TO GO: Collette delivers a career-defining performance. The ending sequence is terrifying. It’s very likely to become a horror classic. The dysfunctional family dynamic feels authentic.
REASONS TO STAY: This might actually be too scary for some.
FAMILY VALUES: There is plenty of graphic violence and disturbing imagery, some drug use and brief nudity.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT:  Wolff, Byrne and Shapiro knew each other from previous film work; Collette alone didn’t know any of the actors that played her family, contributing to her sense of isolation which comes out in the film.
BEYOND THE THEATERS: Amazon, Fandango Now, Google Play, iTunes, Microsoft, Vudu, YouTube
CRITICAL MASS: As of 10/28/18: Rotten Tomatoes: 89% positive reviews. Metacritic: 87/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Rosemary’s Baby
FINAL RATING: 9.5/10
NEXT: Six Days of Darkness Day Four

Point Break (2015)

Attack of the flying squirrels.

(2015) Action (Warner Brothers) Edgar Ramirez, Luke Bracey, Ray Winstone, Teresa Palmer, Matias Varela, Clemens Schick, Tobias Santelmann, Max Thieriot, Delroy Lindo, Nikolai Kinski, Judah Lewis, Glynis Barber, Steve Toussaint, James Le Gros, Bojesse Christopher, Ronak Patani, Eddie Santiago Jordan, Patrick Dewayne, Seumas F. Sargent, Senta Dorothea Kirschner. Directed by Ericson Core

In 1991, Keanu Reeves and the late Patrick Swayze toplined one of the most iconic action films of that decade – Point Break – and now, two decades later, a remake is in theaters. I suppose that was inevitable. In the spirit of “bigger better more,” the Ex-Presidents are now not merely surfers but extreme athletes and world class ones at that.

Johnny Utah (Bracey) is an FBI agent. He wasn’t always one. Seven years ago, he was a YouTube warrior who wanted nothing more than to film extreme motocross stunts that would get him hits on the venerable Internet video channel, but something goes wrong and a friend winds up paying the ultimate price for Johnny’s hubris. Now, he is looking at a daring diamond robbery in which the thieves escape via parachute. Later, they grab some currency from a plane, drop the bills into an impoverished Mexican village and escape via a daring sky dive into a gigantic cave. Utah, being from that world, deduces that the criminals are trying to complete the Ozaki 8, a list of extremely demanding tasks meant to test the limits of the human spirit while at the same time honoring the forces of nature.

When Johnny finds out that there are ginormous waves occurring in the Atlantic, he is certain that the thieves will be there. He is dispatched to the scene under the wing of Agent Pappas (Winstone) from the UK office. He sees a whole flotilla of ships in the region with thrillseekers attempting to surf the waves that are the size of five story buildings. Johnny was never quite as skilled a surfer as others and when he attempts to surf one of the waves, he ends up going to the bottom, only to be rescued by Bodhi (Ramirez), who takes him to a huge yacht owned by Pascal al Fariq (Kinski), one of those insanely wealthy people who have more money than they know what to do with – so they get other people to tell them what to do with it.

As Johnny gets to know Bodhi and his crew, including Grommet (Varela), Roach (Schick), Chowder (Santelmann) and the lovely Samsara (Palmer), he knows he’s found his thieves but he has to prove it. Going against orders, he infiltrates the group and goes with them to ski down insane mountain ranges and put on flysuits to jump off of mountains. Eventually he earns their trust – well, at least the trust of Bodhi and Samsara, the latter of whom he ends up in bed with – but by this time he has begun to change his mind about their motivations and perhaps sympathize with them. So when push comes to shove, which side will Johnny end up on?

This is very much a Keanu Reeves movie without the benefit of Keanu Reeves in it. As Johnny Utah, Bracey resembles Heath Ledger facially but resembles a young Reeves in line delivery and not in a good way. He’s a bit wooden and stiff in his performance. I’m not sure whether that has to do with the writing or Bracey’s ability as an actor. Hopefully it’s not the latter.

The writing is a definite problem. This is the most bro-tastic movie you’ll see, unless the threatened Bill and Ted sequel comes together. You will never hear the word “brother” used so much in a single movie that doesn’t have two males with the same mother in it. It’s definitely a film loaded with testosterone and bro-bonding and bro-mancing is the order of the day here.

I can handle that but dumb is not as easy to dismiss. The plot grows more and more preposterous as the movie goes on and one begins to see through the Bodhi character as a selfish jerk spouting off New Age aphorisms; why would anyone in their right mind follow a guy like him? He talks about giving back to the poor while murdering middle class police officers and endangering innocents all to attain his personal goal. Of course, this is a different time now and people do worship at the altar of the almighty mirror but I didn’t get that feeling from the original film.

Let’s face it; the 1991 film had something in spades that this movie has little of – fun. The original was an entertaining ride. While the stunts here are impressive – and they are impressive – there’s no soul to them. There’s nothing here that makes me feel like I’m having a good time and why on earth would you go to a movie where you weren’t having one?

REASONS TO GO: Nice stunt sequences.
REASONS TO STAY: Dumb and dumber. Too much bro-ism. Ham-fisted acting. Wastes great locations.
FAMILY VALUES: Violence and language, some stupid ideas that nobody should remotely try to imitate, a little bit of sex and a little bit of drugs.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: This was the first film Teresa Palmer acted in after giving birth to her son, coincidentally named Bohdi.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 1/12/16: Rotten Tomatoes: 8% positive reviews. Metacritic: 34/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Chasing Mavericks
FINAL RATING: 3/10
NEXT: Joy

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

Just a couple of hotties.

(1989) Adventure (Paramount) Harrison Ford, Sean Connery, Denholm Elliott, Allison Doody, John Rhys-Davies, Julian Glover, River Phoenix, Kevork Malikyan, Robert Eddison, Richard Young, Alexei Sayle, Alex Hyde-White, Paul Maxwell, Isla Blair. Directed by Steven Spielberg

 

In the third film in the series Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade Spielberg and producer George Lucas wisely returned to the elements that made the first movie great. The movie opens with a prologue that shows Indy as a teenager (Phoenix) trying to foil grave robbers from stealing Coronado’s Cross. Much of his backstory is explained, including how he got the scar on his chin, where he acquired his fedora and the genesis of his phobia of snakes. We also see some of the dynamics of the relationship between Indy and his father, Dr. Henry Jones (Connery) who is obsessed by the legend of the Holy Grail, which he believes to be a real artifact.

After retrieving the Cross as an adult, Indy (Ford) receives a strange package at his office in the University from his father . He is then summoned by wealthy industrialist Walter Donovan (Julian Glover), Indy learns there is an expedition underway to retrieve the Holy Grail itself. That expedition’s leader has disappeared; and the leader turns out to be Indy’s father. Indy and Brody go to Venice, to meet up with his father’s colleague on the team Dr. Schneider (Doody), who turns out to be a she, and together they find the missing information needed to locate the resting place of the Grail.

First, however, Indy is determined to rescue his father, whom he discovers is being held in a castle in Austria. Indy arrives there only to discover that not everyone he has been trusting should be trusted and that some of them are in league with the Nazis (them again). Once again, with Brody and now Sallah (Rhys-Davies), Indy and his father set out to rescue the Grail in a race against the Nazis.

The chemistry between Connery and Ford is absolutely awesome; the two often communicate with merely a glance or a stern look. Their relationship becomes so well defined because of the natural qualities of their by-play. The two spar with each other verbally, with Ford as the son trying to please his father who may well be unpleasable. Screenwriter Jeffrey Boam (who to that point had done Innerspace and The Lost Boys) gives Ford and Connery a slambang story to work with, and the two run with it. Spielberg provides some stunning visuals, and John Williams provided one of his best scores in any film ever.

Doody is an appealing blonde who may well be the prettiest of Indy’s love interests; she is his intellectual equal and is stronger a character than either Karen Allen’s Marion or Kate Capshaw’s Willie from the first two movies. Rhys-Davis and Elliott turn in strong performances and prove why they were so instrumental to the success of the first movie.

The third installment of the Indiana Jones films is almost as good as the first, and in some ways, better. There are some wonderful action sequences (such as a fight in the canals of Venice, a rescue from an Austrian castle and subsequent motorcycle chase and a daring desert rescue from a tank. At the center of the movie however is the relationship between father and son and Connery and Ford, two of the best in the business, make it believable; touching at times, funny at others but authentic in every moment. It is a little ironic that the measure of success for a big summer blockbuster lay in the details of the relationship between father and son, but it is true here. Hollywood could learn a lesson there in how to make a summer film timeless, as this one is.

WHY RENT THIS: Great chemistry between Ford and Connery. Excellent action sequences. A slambang story that has familiarity to the legend. A lighter touch than the last.

WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: The villains are a little less vicious in some ways than the first film.

FAMILY MATTERS: There is some sensuality as well as a bit of action violence. There are a couple of disturbing images as well.

TRIVIAL PURSUITS: The character of Fedora (Young), the character who chases the teenaged Indy through the Utah desert, was originally meant to be Abner Ravenwood, the father of Marion and Indy’s mentor.

NOTABLE HOME VIDEO FEATURES: All of the special features on the DVD are on the fourth disc of the four-disc collection and include a massive Making of the Trilogy featurette that is more than two hours long and includes much behind the scenes footage. There are also featurettes on the stunt work, the music, the special effects and Ben Burtt’s amazing sound work. There is also a promo for the new (at the time) Indiana Jones video game.

BOX OFFICE PERFORMANCE: $474.2M on a $48M production budget; by any standards the movie was yet another blockbuster in the trilogy.

COMPARISON SHOPPING: Raiders of the Lost Ark

FINAL RATING: 10/10

NEXT: The Strangers

Tabloid

Joyce McKinney strikes a pose.

(2010) Documentary (Sundance Selects) Joyce McKinney, Jackson Shaw, Peter Tory, Kent Gavin, Troy Williams, Dr. Hong. Directed by Errol Morris

Some stories are too good to be true. Some are so weird that they could only be true. Some are both – and those are so rare that when they happen, it takes a master documentarian to chronicle them.

Joyce McKinney was a beauty pageant winner (Miss Wyoming World) who, during a stay in Utah, fell in love with a young Mormon man named Kirk Anderson. By all accounts, the feeling was mutual although his parents, devout Mormons, disapproved of the free-spirited McKinney quite acutely. One day, by McKinney’s reckoning, he just up and disappeared – vanished without a trace.

Stung and still deeply in love, she went to Los Angeles and hired a private detective who traced Anderson to England where he was on a mission for the Church – something most Mormon males aspire to. She gets it into her head that Kirk has been brainwashed and sets off to England to indulge in her own brand of de-programming.

Aided by a close friend named Keith May, a bodyguard (who quickly pulled out of the venture) and a pilot named Jackson Shaw (who also pulled out when he discovered what was really going on), she made plans to spirit her love away to a Devon cottage and after a weekend of intense lovemaking and gourmet meals, he made plans to marry her right away and went back to collect his things.

Or, if you believe Anderson’s account, she kidnapped him at gunpoint, shackled him to a bed in a Devon cottage, attempted to seduce him and when that failed, raped him repeatedly after which he lulled her into thinking he wanted to marry her and called the police the moment he got free.

McKinney was later arrested and incarcerated. A story like this even in 1977 was too juicy and too irresistible for the tabloids to pass up and they carried stories of the Case of the Manacled Mormon, as it was referred to at the time. McKinney and May were later released on bail and became quasi-celebrities (McKinney showing up to the London premiere of Saturday Night Fever where she was spotted with John Travolta). However when the crush of the press became too much, McKinney and her partner-in-crime fled the country, disguised as mimes. Yes, mimes!

While in the United States, competing newspapers (The Daily Mail and the Mirror) both sent reporters to try and get the story that was Joyce McKinney. While she allowed the Daily Mail the interview rights, the Mirror sent a journalist who dug into her past and discovered…nude pictures. These were splashed all over the rag’s pages, along with allegations of selling her body for money. There were so many stories out there that nobody really knew who the real Joyce McKinney was.

Neither will you after viewing this movie but for once, that’s a good thing. We really get only one viewpoint as to the events depicted here – McKinney’s (Anderson, quite wisely I think, declined to be interviewed for the film as he has for all other interviews about the incident). We don’t even get Morris’ viewpoint which is something he’s notorious for. He is one of the most objective documentarians alive. Whether he thought McKinney raped Anderson or had a tryst with him he keeps to himself.

I’ll be honest, early on I was believing McKinney’s version. She seemed to be so effervescent, so sweet and so believable. However the more she talked, the less she seemed to make sense and after a short while you begin to understand she’s a totally unreliable witness. Da Queen called her cuckoo and she might actually be, but the longer the film goes, the more bizarre it gets.

Because there’s only one point of view, we really don’t get compelling evidence that Anderson’s version is the right one. Peter Tory, a reporter for the Daily Mail, opines that the truth is probably somewhere in between the two stories – that there were some consensual elements that Anderson felt prudent to hide, but that somewhere along the way he got cold feet particularly when it came to marrying McKinney, which she clearly believed was about to happen.

This is one of the most fascinating and compelling documentaries you’re ever likely to see, and while it isn’t a game changer like, say Capitalism: A Love Story and An Inconvenient Truth, it is going to at least keep your interest and stay with you long after the film is over.

REASONS TO GO: Fascinating stuff

REASONS TO STAY: It just keeps getting weirder, and weirder, and weirder…

FAMILY VALUES: There’s some sexual content and nudity.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Morris uses a technique called the Interrotron, in which he uses mirrors to give his interview subjects a face to respond to rather than speaking to a blank lens.

HOME OR THEATER: Certainly well-suited to home theater for those who prefer their titillation in private.

FINAL RATING: 7.5/10

TOMORROW: Bruce Almighty

127 Hours

James Franco might just be looking at Oscar gold.

(2010) True Life Drama (Fox Searchlight) James Franco, Amber Tamblyn, Kate Mara, Clemence Posey, Kate Burton, Treat Williams, Sean Bott, John Lawrence, Rebecca Olson, Lizzy Caplan, Pieter Jan Brugge, Jeffrey Wood. Directed by Danny Boyle

Being capable can sometimes be confused with being arrogant. However, being capable can sometimes cause one to become arrogant. Arrogance can then lead to hubris and that can lead to the kind of disaster that can change a life completely.

Aron Ralston (Franco) is the prototypical Type A personality. He never met a physical activity he didn’t like, a challenge he couldn’t face. He’s at his happiest when he’s alone in the canyons of Utah’s Canyonland National Park, even though it’s a bit of a hike from his Colorado home. Sure, he has friends like Brian (Lawrence) whom he works with and even Rana (Olson), an ex-girlfriend who sees through the cocky bravado and pronounces that he will end up alone.

Still, Aron is naturally charming as he proves when he meets a couple of pretty young women (Mara, Tamblyn) out hiking. They’re lost, he knows his way around and soon they’re frolicking around in an underground pond. When they separate, one leans into the other and says “You know, I don’t think we even figured into his day.” And they’re right, although he will eventually look back on their encounter with some regret.

He’s going to have the opportunity to dwell on that, and other aspects of his life. While crossing a cut canyon, he steps on a boulder he thought was stable and goes plummeting, downwards-like. When he lands, he discovers the rather inconvenient fact that his arm is pinned to the canyon wall by a boulder the size of a home AC unit. He tries to move the boulder, but no good. He tries pounding the boulder, unsuccessfully. He takes a deep breath, lays out all the contents of his backpack and tries to think. The sinking realization is that nobody knows where he is. Nobody can hear his cries for help. His water supply is limited as is his food. He has no real tools that can extricate him from the situation apart from a multi-purpose tool with a dull knife blade.

After freaking out a little bit, Aron realizes the grim situation he is in. He has only enough water to last him a few days. Nothing short of a jackhammer is going to get that rock off of him. He is going to die. 

Dying is a funny thing, particularly when you have time to wait for it. You are given a chance to reflect back on your life, see the road not traveled and figure out who you are and what didn’t work. And, as his water begins to run out, the lack of sleep and the exposure to the elements begins to play with his mind. And as his time runs out, he is faced with a devastating choice between the will to survive and a horror that thee and me could never contemplate.

Most of you know by now that Aron Ralston is an actual person who went through this, and that devastating choice was whether to saw off his own arm with the dull knife or else wait to die. Obviously he chose the former, and stumbled out of that canyon to be rescued by a pair of hikers who alerted authorities.

You wonder how a film set in a cramped space for 127 hours – a little over five days – can be a riveting experience but Oscar-winning director Boyle makes it so. Even though for the most part you know what everything is leading to, you get to see inside the person that Ralston is. During his ordeal, he made several entries on a digital video camera that essentially detailed what he was going through but also served as a goodbye and apology to his family for the times he put his own needs ahead of theirs. In the end, he realizes that he had insulated himself from the things in life that were most important.

Franco is an expressive and often physical actor who is perfectly cast here. This might be the defining performance of his career; it is as sure a bet to be nominated for the Best Actor Oscar in a few months as any performance this year is. He is onscreen for the entire movie and spends much of it alone. He has to capture the attention and imagination of the audience without interacting with anybody other than himself, and he does it in a way that is both natural and unforced.

The amputation scene is not as graphic as you might think, although there are reports of people fainting during it. It certainly is disturbing and I would think long and hard if I were the sensitive sort about putting myself through it. If you have someone who is affected by such, you might want to take it under advisement that they might not do well at this movie although the scene isn’t gratuitous in the least.

The cinematography here is breathtaking, utilizing the majestic desolation of the Utah landscape as a character in the movie. It is this that Aron disrespects and winds up paying a heavy price.

REASONS TO GO: A career-making performance by Franco and another great movie by Boyle. This is the kind of movie that stays with you long after its over.

REASONS TO STAY: Sensitive sorts will be disturbed by the amputation scene, and claustrophobics might be made uncomfortable with the surroundings in the film.

FAMILY VALUES: There is a lot of bad language (hey, you’d curse if you had a boulder on your arm) and some pretty disturbing scenes of self-amputation that are definitely not for the squeamish.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: The camcorder that James Franco uses in the film is the same one used by Ralston on his ill-fated trek. The video he shot had only previously been shown to family and close friends, but Boyle and Franco were allowed to watch it for accuracy sake. The video is kept in a vault for safekeeping.

HOME OR THEATER: Much of the film takes place in a cut canyon, a very narrow environment, but some of the shots of Canyonlands National Park are just breathtaking and should be seen on the big screen.

FINAL RATING: 8/10

TOMORROW: Police, Adjective

September Dawn

You'd better be good or Jon Voight will go all Old Testament on your ass.

(Black Diamond) Jon Voight, Trent Ford, Tamara Hope, Jon Gries, Taylor Handley, Huntley Ritter, Daniel Libman, Dean Cain, Lolita Davidovich, Shaun Johnston, Terence Stamp. Directed by Christopher Cain

So much pain, so much bloodshed has been perpetrated in the name of God and Christ. Even today, religious fanaticism and intolerance has led to the most heinous of acts.

In the late summer and early fall of 1857, the Fancher-Baker wagon train, led by the redoubtable Captain Fancher (Johnston) reaches Utah territory and the land of Bishop Samuelson (Voight) of the Mormon church. They are exhausted, and need food, supplies and rest before pushing over the rest of the Rockies to make it to California, where they are bringing Kentucky racehorses for the purpose of gambling. Samuelson’s sons, Jonathan (Ford) and Micah (Handley) meet the party with unfriendly distrust.

The Mormons had good reason to mistrust. They were on the verge of being invaded by the U.S. Army, as the American government was not too pleased with the idea of a religious theocracy developing on American soil. The prophet of the Mormons, Joseph Smith (Dean Cain) had been murdered at the hands of an angry Missouri mob, an event witnessed by Samuelson himself. However, he is the voice of hospitality as he tones down the boys’ unwelcoming and bids the settlers stay and rest awhile.

What he really wants to do is keep them close by while he can keep an eye on them and find out what they’re up to. What he thinks they’re up to is to sneak guns in to help murder Mormon citizens of Utah and pave the way for the U.S. military to wipe them all out. He is further disturbed by the sight of a woman, Nancy Dunlap (Davidovich) wearing pants, a no-no in Mormon culture…well in American culture pretty much of the time as well.

He means to punish the infidels or Mericats as the Mormons called them and praises God for delivering them into his hands for punishment, or more accurately retribution. Simultaneously, the Fancher party’s Reverend Hudson (Libman) is giving thanks to God for the party’s deliverance into hospitable hands.

Jonathan has fallen for the good Reverend’s spirited daughter Emily (Hope) who challenges him on an intellectual level that none of the local girls is able to do. However, to his horror, his father has ordered that the party be wiped out with the complicit support of Mormon leader Brigham Young (Stamp). Mormon leaders approach the local Paiute tribe to do their dirty work, warning the Native Americans that the party is out to take their land.

When the Paiutes fail to carry out the Mormon’s plan, John Lee (Gries), a militia leader for the Mormon Church, offers to escort the Fancher party to safety if they lay down their arms, which would appease the hostiles. Instead, on the morning of September 11, 1857 he leads them to the Mountain Meadows where the party is ambushed and massacred, with only the small children being allowed to live, taken to be raised as Mormons by Mormon families.

Most of the events above actually happened; the massacre did take place 144 years before the World Trade Center fell. In all fairness, there is no historical evidence that confirms that Brigham Young condoned or even knew about the attack; his deposition, which is recreated here, took place nearly a decade after the events occurred (the Civil War kept the United States a little busy before they could return and properly investigate the massacre). Only Lee was ever charged or convicted for the crime, and his execution is shown at the movie’s conclusion, in fairly graphic but accurate detail.

The Mormon Church has decried the movie, saying it is anti-Mormon and historically inaccurate and certainly there are plenty of inaccuracies here. However, it is widely believed that Young’s strident teachings created an atmosphere that allowed the massacre to take place. Certainly that Mormons took part in the crime is beyond doubt.

One doesn’t look to Hollywood for history lessons, and if you do, you do so at your own peril. Director Cain has been accused of making the film in order to derail the presidential campaign of Mitt Romney, a charge which is patently ridiculous (the writing and preparation for the film took place long before Romney announced his candidacy). Whether there is anti-Mormonism in the movie is a judgment call; I for one didn’t detect that it was particularly against the Church of Latter-Day Saints but certainly depicted individuals within that Church as fanatic and paranoid.

Voight is a tremendous actor, and he gets license to go over-the-top and he does so with a great deal of gusto. He wears his Old Testament beard like a genuine prophet, or at least a man believing himself to be. There are some nuances to his performance that I liked a great deal, as he portrays Bishop Samuelson as a man scarred by his own inability to save his wife or Joseph Smith, and a man enraged by the threat of the Gentiles, as the Mormons then referred non-Mormons as.

The romance between Jonathan and Emily simply doesn’t work for me. They get together mainly because the screenplay tells them to; I never got the impression that there was anything binding them together that was real or believable. Johnston is suitably heroic as Captain Fancher, and Handley suitably tormented as Micah. Most of the rest of the performances are of the movie-of-the-week variety.

I do like that a nearly-forgotten incident from American history has been brought to light for public debate. The details of the Massacre remain cloudy to this day. The crime remains a heinous one, even by modern standards; women and children were shot, sometimes at point-blank range. Their remains were left unburied to be consumed by animals and scattered by the elements. Witnesses who came to the site years later proclaimed it to be one of the most horrific things they’d ever seen.

This is a movie that may well have excited a certain amount of debate on the subject if only it had been a little bit better. Far too much emphasis was placed on the star-crossed romance that never occurred. A movie about the Massacre that focused on the people who were victimized by it as well as those who were complicit in its planning and execution might have made for far more gripping fare. Still, I was at least motivated to do further research on the event and learn a bit more, so some good did come of the movie as far as I’m concerned.

WHY RENT THIS: Brings to light a forgotten event in American history that shouldn’t be. Even though he’s chewing the scenery somewhat, Voight still manages to be compelling.

WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: This certainly depicts the Mormons in a very unflattering light; some might be offended by it. The romance between Emily and Jonathan is less than scintillating.

FAMILY VALUES: The depiction of the massacre is pretty brutal and is not for the impressionable.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Reverend Hudson and his daughter Emily actually left the wagon train before it reached Utah; also, Nancy Dunlap’s husband is said in the film to have died before the action takes place, but historically he perished in the massacre.

NOTABLE DVD EXTRAS: There is a featurette on the historical aspects of the massacre which tend to support the theories of the filmmakers – take these with a grain of salt. Of more interest are interviews with the descendents of those who perished in the massacre, which lends some perspective on the events of the film. It may not be a bad idea to watch both of these features before viewing the actual film.

FINAL RATING: 5/10

TOMORROW: How About You