Attack the Block

Released:  July 39^th, 2011

Rated:  R

Distributor:  Screen Gems

Starring:  John Boyega, Jodie Whittaker, Alex Esmail, Franz Drameh, Leeon Jones, Simon Howard, Luke Treadaway, Jumayn Hunter, Nick Frost

Directed by:  Joe Cornish

Written by:  Joe Cornish

Personal Bias Alert:  not a horror-comedy connoisseur, went in with high expectations

7.8 of 10

            A young woman walks down the street after nightfall.  She calls her mom, laments her late work night, and gets off the phone in time to see a group of teenage boys eyeing her.  She pauses but continues on, perhaps not wanting to jump to gross stereotypes, but realizes her error when two of the boys circle behind her and the rest cut off her path.  So begins a night that takes the woman and the teens in unusual directions, and not just because of the alien that lands next to them.  That is just the terrifying impetus for a culturally aware horror-comedy, a mix so delightfully brewed that it’ll have you gleefully basking in every joke and smatter of blood.

            Despite opening with the woman, the movie quickly focuses on the group of young thugs, a bunch of lower-class boys on the brink of getting into real trouble.  Yes, they mug people, but they’re still removed from the guns and hard drugs floating around their council house.  In fact, their lack of guns is what leads to much of the fun in this movie.  We’ve all seen countless gunfights, but hand-to-hand combat with terrifying space creatures is pretty rad, and the boy’s scrappy nature and burgeoning bravery is what makes them so darn endearing.  Moses (an excellent John Boyega) leads the group, eventually taking in the young woman and a couple other acquaintances as they battle the aliens swarming their block.  A dissertation could probably be written on the role of Moses and it’s relation to the religious figure, but suffice it to say that the name, like many other things in this film, was carefully chosen.

            Attack the Block was made on a relatively limited budget ($13 million US), which made such careful planning a necessity.  The slick ease with which the film plays out is the best tell for how strong a grasp writer/director Joe Cornish had on the material, who clearly has no fear when it comes to mixing genres.  The one-liners are pretty rapid-fire, and even though I never laughed out loud, the levity these quips bring shouldn’t be underestimated.  He also, somewhat surprisingly, ratchets up the gore during the attacks, mixing the terrifying and the slightly silly aspects into condensed little jolts that come about much more often than you’d expect.  Particularly for its budget, Attack the Block gives you the aliens and gives them to you often.  And boy, are those some excellently designed aliens.  Covered in fur so black they’re hard to make out, they’re all gleaming teeth and terrifically weird snarls.  Despite being a familiar shape and drawing from their monster-movie predecessors, these aliens retain a peculiarity that keeps their menace ever present.

            Cornish, being very new to features, clearly understood how to structure such a story, but this familiarity is the film’s biggest downfall.  There are a few too many clunky establishing shots and obvious foreshadowing moments, ones so glaring to anyone familiar with the home invasion genre should figure out the ending without even trying.  Cornish seemed to lack the ability to really branch out when it comes to the basics of the story, so while the accoutrement is delightful, the core of Attack the Block lacks that extra special something.

            At the very least, Cornish understood that his story couldn’t support a long film, so you’re in and out before that 90-minute mark hits.  What takes place in that brief time is incredibly fun, mildly scary, and a bit thought-provoking; exactly, I think, the mix Cornish was going for.

Other Notes:

Ø  Boyega, by the way, is the man who pops into frame at the very beginning of the Star Wars:  The Force Awakens trailer.

Ø  Also, hurrah for Luke Treadaway, who’s now Victor Frankenstein in my favorite TV series, Penny Dreadful.

Ø  I did cheat and turn on the subtitles.  Those accents were a bit too difficult for me to understand, but I still loved them.

Ø  “Maybe there was a part at the zoo, and a monkey fucked a fish.”

Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation

Released:  July 31^st, 2015

Rated:  PG-13

Distributor:  Paramount Pictures

Starring:  Tom Cruise, Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Ving Rhames, Sean Harris, Alec Baldwin

Directed by:  Christopher McQuarrie

Written by:  Christopher McQuarrie

Personal Bias Alert:  never seen a M:I movie, likes Tom Cruise

8 of 10

            Ah, Tom Cruise, the man who jumped onto a couch and (allegedly) killed his career.  It’s true that since that incident only 5 of his 11 films have grossed more than $100 million domestically and his public persona has been overcome by the odd actions many link to his religious beliefs, but the reality is that Cruise was unfairly judged for expressing exuberant love all those years ago.  Americans are now suspicious of their once-beloved movie star, but anyone willing to give his films a chance know that his magnetism hasn’t faded.  Now, Cruise has passed the 50-year mark, entering the later portion of a career that he has worked diligently to construct, and it’s a shame that he’s relegated to rebuilding instead of reaping from a diverse career.  Still, he’s got his action stalwart Mission:  Impossible series to hang from, and it’s only a matter of time before audiences realize that he brings the same level of enthusiasm and effort to all his other films as well.

            Rogue Nation, the fifth installment of the series, finds Cruise’s Ethan Hunt and his fellow IMF agents hunting a shadowy organization called the Syndicate.  The CIA doesn’t even buy that the group exists, and after forcing the IMF to disband and declaring Hunt a threat, the team must track down and stop the group without the aid of official backing.  As is wont to happen in this series, that means an endless parade of action spectacle, a series of setup and execution scenes that loosely build to a climax and have a great time getting there.  It’s not the most artful affair; in fact, most of its elements are straight genre stalwarts, but the pacing is excellent, moving swiftly between set pieces and explaining things just enough so that everyone’s motivations make sense.  This sucker is tailor-made for blockbuster season (despite its initial release date in December), and it’s one of the best to grace our screens this summer.

            The other great of the season, Mad Max:  Fury Road, shares many similarities with Rogue Nation, perhaps providing a template for commercially and critically successful action films for years to come.  Both films lean heavily on live stunts, meaning that what you see is what actually happened, and the palpable realism of these sequences is what left so many slack-jawed.  In case you didn’t already know, Tom Cruise was tied to a plane that actually took off with him outside, a stunt that few other actors (or human beings, for that matter) would try in the age of CGI.  Why would he risk it?  Because Cruise wants to entertain us, and he knows that audiences can still tell the difference between reality and fiction.  Putting real people in elaborately (and brilliantly) staged sequences allows the cameramen and the characters to react to the insanity happening around them, adding a frenzied liveliness that CGI work simply hasn’t been able to replicate.  Delivering these breathless moments in an efficient fashion is what so impresses people, and both of these films have the pacing and dedication that sets themselves apart.

            Cruise, of course, is a known asset to these sorts of films, carrying the banner for live stunts and old-school movie stardom at a time when no one else seems committed to either.  The big find of the film is his female costar, Rebecca Ferguson.  She struts through the film as a real-life badass, handling the action and the exposition with a charm that equals her scene-mate, even outshining him with her more nuanced quiet moments.  She is the true second lead of the film, with Simon Pegg coming in at a close third, and the trio is a delight to watch navigate their character’s twisty relationships.  The movie relies less on a clear plot and more on keeping you on your toes, and all the cast pulls off this light-but-serious balance that other similar series seem unable to locate.

            While never crossing into silly territory, Rogue Nation is very shallow, fading from your mind quickly after you walk out of the theater.  The generic plot and barely memorable villain is its downfall, but these are mere quibbles when you’re sitting in the theater.  What Rogue Nation gives you is a thoroughly American film filled with astounding violence, one that remembers that modern audiences don’t want to see their heroes ride off into the sunset.  We prefer to see them limp off to the next battle.

Other Notes:

Ø  Get ready for more of Rebecca Ferguson.  There’s no way she walks away from this and her upcoming film with Meryl Streep without getting stacks of scripts to choose from.

Ø  Ferguson is also the youngest main cast member at 31.  Take that young Hollywood.

Ø  If you like this, go back and watch last year’s Edge of Tomorrow.  You won’t be disappointed.

Southpaw

Released:  July 24^th, 2015

Rated:  R

Distributor:  The Weinstein Company

Starring:  Jake Gyllenhaal, Forest Whitaker, Rachel McAdams, Oona Laurence

Directed by:  Antoine Fuqua

Written by:  Kurt Sutter

Personal Bias Alert:  loved Sons of Anarchy, likes boxing movies

5.7 of 10

            What’s so great about Kurt Sutter, who’s previously written for The Shield and created Sons of Anarchy, is that he manages to craft ultra-masculine stories without demeaning women or disregarding his character’s emotions.  Sure, there’s porn stars and hookers and loose women, but when really examined, these characters tend to have families, responsibilities, and fierce wills.  Sons of Anarchy, which centered on a biker gang in California, is an intricate examination on male bonding, one where the relationships became familial and the men comfortably expressed their love for each other.  That might seem incongruous given their leather-clad, tough guy exteriors, but they, and the show, were softies under all the violence and mayhem.  With such a writer behind it, the boxing drama Southpaw should stir up some strong expectations, but it fails to deliver anything as smart or as surprising as Sutter’s previous work.

            This is Sutter’s first foray into movie writing, and the format is, perhaps, not the best fit.  His strengths shine in sprawling complexity, and the two hours he got to work with in Southpaw aren’t well used.  There’s a lack of urgency to this plot, laying out a simple tale of loss and redemption that lacks originality and thematic weight.  The fighting metaphor that goes so hand-in-hand with boxing films needs something more behind it, and this film, quite simply, drops the ball on its secondary plots.  There’s hints of other stories brimming off to the side, like the safe haven building Tick (Forest Whitaker) and the inescapability of one’s background, but none ever become fully examined, feeling more like asides that prop up instead of building on the main storyline.

            The pairing of Sutter with the equally masculinity-focused director Antoine Fuqua was a more troubling prospect, as Fuqua has a rough track record when it comes to the quality of his films.  He struggles with Southpaw, never finding a consistent visual tone and failing to ever provide a break from the dour proceedings.  It’s funny, because he’s clearly done his homework, copying the visual styles from classic boxing movies (the gym scenes pull heavily from the lighting in Million Dollar Baby) but never settles on any one approach.  It gives the film a disjointed feel, moving from the drab cave of the gym to the glaring lights of Madison Square Garden without any sense of comment.  Perhaps if he had crafted the contrast into some meaning it would’ve felt more natural, but this and other inserted visual flairs feel like just that, flair, instead of something to really make note of.

            Much ado has been made about Jake Gyllenhaal’s physical heft as the light heavyweight champ Billy Hope, and his physicality, both in size and in the way he carries himself as the battered boxer, deserves adoration.  The dedication to his gym prep shows, a necessary step to playing a realistic boxer, but it’s that body movement, the shuffling weariness of a person who’s taken a beating, that elevates the performance.  Gyllenhaal is one of the greats when it comes to inhabiting a character, but he’s never overly showy about it, always playing to the strengths of the film and not overstepping into gaudiness.  Playing right along at his level is Rachel McAdams as his wife, Maureen.  She’s a classic Sutter momma, knowing her place when out in the world but fiercely fighting behind the scenes for the man she loves.  McAdams brings her all to the pivotal role, and her commitment and natural interplay with Gyllenhaal is what makes the film work.

            Gyllenhaal sells the hell out of this lightweight film, but its failings show in how drawn out the whole thing feels.  Their either needed to be more to the story or twenty less minutes to the film, because it’s current iteration is too dour to be fun and too empty to be great.  Gyllenhaal and McAdams makes what is there work, though, and that is far from a complete loss.

Other Notes:

Ø  Whitaker and Naomi Harris make for some woefully underused side characters.

Ø  Speaking of Naomi Harris, did I detect a romance between her and Gyllenhaal that was left on the cutting room floor?

Ø  Southpaw:  a left-handed person, especially a boxer who leads with the right hand or a baseball pitcher

Is the Man Who Is Tall Happy?

Released:  November 25^th, 2013

Rated:  Unrated

Distributor:  IFC Films

Starring:  Noam Chomsky, Michel Gondry

Directed by:  Michel Gondry

Written by:  Michel Gondry

Personal Bias Alert:  not familiar with Chomsky, likes Gondry’s films

7.8 of 10

7

Well, this is an odd little…what?  Documentary?  I suppose that’s the closest category to put it in, although there’s no story being told here.  It’s simply an interview with writer/director Michel Gondry asking questions of the linguist, philosopher, political activist, and man of many intellectual hats Noam Chomsky.  However, instead of the usual (and much easier) talking heads setup, Gondry takes the time to animate the conversation, limiting the use of live footage to only small chunks of the conversation that were intermittently captured by a camera on a timer.  This may sound sparse to you, but in an age where TED Talks and other lecture series have hit it big in the podcast world, it’s unsurprising to find a filmmaker taking on the challenge of livening up such an event.

There will, of course, always be an entry barrier to this sort of work.  You have to enjoy talks and lectures, be the kind of person willing to sit through long, unstructured conversations that require the utmost mental attention with little to no need to insert your own opinions.  I have faith that the crossover between this sort of audience and serious film fans is rather strong, as the desire to sit still and be challenged is a requirement for both groups.  Still, if you fall asleep during school or watch the clock drag by during presentations, you should definitely skip Is the Man Who Is Tall Happy, because it delivers something much closer to the lecture format than to a traditional documentary.

The conversation itself meanders, touching on many aspects of Chomsky’s work without any sense of structure or pace.  At times, it presents incredibly challenging concepts that might require you to go back and rewatch a few times to understand, which if you’ve decided to give this film a try is likely what you’re looking for.  Personally, I don’t know anything about Chomsky or his work, but I’ve got a background in psychology, so the rudiments of what he was talking about was familiar to me.  Someone without such a background, like Gondry, will struggle even more to keep up, especially given the language barrier that the two faced.  Gondry speaks only passable English, so there are times when the conversation between the two becomes muddled by misunderstanding.  These make for interesting moments that exist entirely outside of Chomsky’s intellect, giving a glimpse into how the minds of a deeply studious linguist and a creative layman bounce off of and react to each other.  Instead of slowing the film down, these moments make for perhaps the only aspect that feels like a traditional film, moments where two characters come into conflict and must resolve (or ignore) the problem in front of them.

The cinematic aspect, i.e. Gondry’s drawings, largely aims to compliment the conversation going on.  They occasionally dabble in illuminating or making more clear the concepts being discussed, but they mostly shy away from such pursuits (I have doubts that Gondry understood the concepts clearly enough to explain them).  Instead, it largely takes the shape of something like doodles, the kind of half-thought out sketches that jittery-handed people make when intensely focused on something else.  The images glide around the conversation, forming into simplistic expressions that pulse with the flow of the conversation.  It’s a similar effect to being hypnotized by the visualizations on a music player.  You’re mostly focused on the noise, but the bright colors bouncing in response keeps all other distractions tuned out.  In doing so, Gondry’s animation actually emphasizes Chomsky’s words, sucking you in in a way that talking heads simply wouldn’t have accomplished.

Gondry seems to have a great respect for Noam Chomsky, but the desire to preserve him yet again is a bit baffling.  Chomsky’s books are numerous, and he’s appeared many times in film and television formats much more accessible than this.  Although, perhaps Gondry’s aim wasn’t one of preservation but a desire to express his own excitement about Chomsky’s work.  Such a selfish intent isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but the lack of structure or central concept keeps the whole thing from having much of an effect.  The film is interesting and captivating while you watch it, but it slips from the mind quickly, leaving any long-term takeaways too few and too simplistic to have a lasting effect.

Other Notes:

Ø  Gondry is too kind to be a documentarian.  He fails to push Chomsky when painful things come up.

Ø  Watching this, I went into the stupor I often do when intensely focused:  an almost asleep daze where my body shuts down while my mind is whirring away.

Ø  Is the man who tall is happy?

Ant-Man

Released:  July 17^th, 2015

Rated:  PG-13

Distributor:  Walt Disney Studios

Starring:  Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Corey Stoll, Bobby Cannavale, Michael Peña, Tip “T.I.” Harris, Michael Douglas, Judy Greer

Directed by:  Peyton Reed

Written by:  Edgar Wright, Joe Cornish, Adam McKay, Paul Rudd

Personal Bias Alert:  never heard of Ant-Man, likes the cast

6 of 10

            Remember when Guardians of the Galaxy was considered a risk?  It was an expansion of the MCU with little-known characters and a hint of nostalgia, all wrapped up in a space-western bow?  Then the film and its star, Chris Pratt, became the beloved breakouts of 2014, leaving the troubled Ant-Man as the last “risk” of MCU’s phase 2.  Let’s face it, anything with that Marvel label isn’t an actual risk, financially or creatively, as they are controlled and marketed by the most commercially influential studio of our time.  But with development and production spanning nearly ten years and a director switch mere months before shooting, the footing seemed especially shaky for the little hero that could.  As if on cue, Ant-Man rolled out to a resounding and deserved ‘meh’.

            If you haven’t heard of Ant-Man (Paul Rudd), rest assured that his powers are exactly what they sound like:  he shrinks to ant size, acquires the super-strength of an ant, and controls his ant comrades.  I guess this is a slight step up from Aquaman, but really, I’m surprised that I’ve never heard this guy come up in any ‘worst superpower ever’ debates.  Anyway, his MCU debut follows the tired and true origin story plot to a fault, complete with an older mentor played by a famous actor (Michael Douglas), a drawn-out training montage that acclimatizes the character and the audience to his powers, and a cackling bad guy that is personally entwined with our heroes.  In fact, the setup and training period is so yawn-inducing that I was surprised when no further wrinkle to the plot was ever revealed.  As the film buzzed into its finale, I had the shocking revelation that this was really all it was going to be, and that wasn’t quite enough for a satisfying film.

            Now, small plots aren’t necessarily a bad thing, but they’re just plain boring when the tone of the film is so lifeless.  Rudd, who has a wonderfully disreputable charm, is the perfect casting choice for the burglar-turned-hero, but his hands are tied behind his back by the utter blandness of his character.  Like so many heroes in the MCU, he gets a short background that relates directly to his becoming a superhero, while the rest of him is left blank.  Any emotional traits these characters have lack nuance and are so simplistic that they can be described using caveman speak.  It’s sad to see Rudd so robbed of personality, and the scattered jokes he does get were surely added by himself and Adam McKay (who both get screenwriting credits).  The rest of the characters don’t fare any better, with Corey Stoll going way too big as the almost mustache-twisting bad guy and Evangeline Lily getting hamstrung by a forced romance and head-scratching motives.  Douglas gets the most fleshed-out character, but daddy figures don’t fare well in this universe, plus his ‘revelations’ are so obvious that they can only be withheld until midway through the film.

            But eventually that third act does kick in, and the final battle delivers the cool but silly fun that should accompany a character called Ant-Man.  From a technical standpoint, the way they capture Ant-Man’s changing size is a nice visual change-up from the usual punch-and-shoot battles.  They vary the scale that we see the fight in to match whatever size Ant-Man is taking, making the action sequences a trippy little treat.  Despite its relatively modest budget (it’s the lowest production budget of any MCU film), the effects are dazzling, providing the only interesting element that spans the entire film.

            The idea of giving this largely unknown and offbeat hero an introductory movie that matches his size wasn’t a bad call.  It’s the fumbling that occurred with the script, directing, and editing that makes this film so lifelessly forgettable.  Perhaps this lack of spark is what caused original director Edgar Wright to jump ship, leaving his replacement with only one last-minute defense:  to lay there like a slug.

Other Notes (Ridiculous Plot Point Version):

Ø  At one point, it’s claimed that Ant-Man’s suit has more potential dangers than Tony Stark’s, which is complete crap.

Ø  Along the same lines, what’s with the conceit that the suit would give the bad guys such a grave upper hand if they got ahold of it?  All you’d have to do is give the technology to the good guys, too, and the playing field would be level again.

Ø  The mysterious long-term mental effects of the serum makes no sense in this movie’s mythology.

Ø  So was Rudd’s character a Robin Hood-esque figure or a common burglar before he became Ant-Man?

Other Notes (Normal Version):

Ø  I really like the Ant-Man suit.

Ø  Let’s all take a collection and fund a solo movie for Michael Peña, because it was painful to see him relegated to this role.

Ø  *Credits Sequence Spoiler*:  Yeah, about time we get a female character that can actually fight with the big boys.

Quick Shots

Trainwreck

Released:  July 17^th, 2015

Rated:  R

Distributor:  Universal Pictures

Starring:  Amy Schumer, Tilda Swinton, Bill Hader, John Cena, Brie Larson, Colin Quinn

Directed by:  Judd Apatow

Written by:  Amy Schumer

Personal Bias Alert:  not an Apatow fan, likes nearly all the supporting cast

4.9 of 10

            Writer and star Amy Schumer’s career has been on a meteoric rise the last couple years, with her sketch comedy series gaining more and more ardent followers with each successive outing.  Its third season has a 100% on Rotten Tomatoes and gained a Peabody Award alongside programs like the political thriller The Honorable Woman and the news satire Last Week Tonight, a background which might prime you for a smart comedy that skewers societal norms or plays with genre standards.  That’s how Trainwreck is being billed, and even how many critics are taking it, but it’s actually little more than a bawdy outfit covering a very traditional walk of shame.

            Amy’s Amy (yep, the character shares her name) is a 30-something magazine writer who’s a bit too self-absorbed and way too damaged to commit to a relationship when a fling with one of her article’s subjects threatens to knock her life back onto the tracks.  The plot is as traditional as they come, trying to distract you from its tameness with raunch that has a surprisingly nasty undertone.  Any deviation from traditional sexuality (i.e. loving man-woman stuff) is played for laughs in protracted, lazy sex scenes that border on offensive to those of us with an open mind about what turns people on.  I mean, am I really supposed to laugh at a guy who’s in touch with his emotions, has healthy relationships and goals, and may or may not be gay?

            However, when the comedy manages to get back on the right side of offensive, it delivers some bursting laughs.  An almost unrecognizable Tilda Swinton appears as a one-liner machine and LeBron James proves a surprisingly adept straight-man, with most of the big moments reserved for Amy herself.  But the hits are outweighed by the cringe-inducing misses, and the alleged social commentary is as out of date as a grown man making a comedy about a (wo)man-child.

______________________________________

Amy

Rated:  R

Distributor:  A24

Directed by:  Asif Kapadia

Edited by:  Chris King

Personal Bias Alert:  not an Amy Winehouse fan

7.5 of 10

            I just couldn’t get behind Amy Winehouse when she was alive, and it had everything to do with her talent.  Her music was an honest glimpse inside a troubled mind, and the frail body belting it out left no doubts about its authenticity.  By the time she burst into the mainstream and into my life with Rehab, her path seemed to already be tread, and I chose not to go along for the tragedy.  With this documentary, Asif Kapadia aims to dig deeper into the whys of Winehouse’s life, but what comes up oddly missing is Amy herself.

            While using traditional interviews, Kapadia completely avoids the talking head setup that many docs lean on, instead putting the audio of these sit-downs over the voluminous footage, both public and private, of Winehouse herself.  The structure is still very linear, with the movie spanning approximately the last 15 years of Winehouse’s life.  What we come to find out is that Winehouse was troubled from even these early years, suffering from depression and self-medicating with drugs, alcohol, and music for most of her life.  This causes the doc to take on the familiar and winding story of the untreated depressive, a slog of ups and downs that leads only to a final, sputtering end.  This lack of arc becomes a bit frustrating as the film drags itself over two hours, sticking resolutely to Amy’s disintegrating life instead of building with her career’s success.

            What Kapadia undeniably captures, though, is Winehouse’s skill and love of music.  Her most forceful opinions and truest expressions stem from this, highlighted by wonderfully added text of her lyrics and isolated vocal tracks.  With Winehouse dead long before the production was conceived, this is the closest thing we have to personal musings on her own life, but even this is only what she could surmise through the haze of her depression.  Because she was never able to beat back the disease, we will never get a clear view of what Winehouse thought of herself.  It’s the elephant in the room, so to speak, and Kapadia never comes up with a way to work around it.  It gives the film a hint of unintentional voyeurism, a feeling made all the more uneasy as the constant spotlight accelerates Winehouse’s decline.  The closest thing we come to a clear-headed moment in the back half of the film is a brief scene where Winehouse gets to do something she’s always dreamed of.  Her wonder at the moment breaks through the haze, but by then she’s too far gone to recover, drenching the whole scene in tragedy.  That’s the greatest achievement of Amy:  instilling the wish that her life could’ve gone on, not for our own selfish reasons, but for her.

What's Eating Gilbert Grape

Released:  December 17^th, 1993

Rated:  PG-13

Distributor:  Paramount Pictures

Starring:  Johnny Depp, Leonardo DiCaprio, Juliette Lewis, Mary Steenburgen, Crispin Glover, John C. Reilly, Darlene Cates

Directed by:  Lasse Hallström

Written by:  Peter Hedges

Personal Bias Alert:  from the countryside of America, values family

9 of 10

            American films are often criticized for getting the interior of the country wrong, and as a native of the Midwest, I must pipe up in agreement.  There are a smattering of movies that seem to understand the good and the bad of small town life, but most pander, representing us as wholesome, god-fearing folks that may not be the brightest but have their hearts in the right place.  The complexity of our makeup is lost, and uneducated becomes synonymous with unintelligent.  This couldn’t be further from the truth in What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, a film written by an Iowan that seems hell-bent on dispelling these misconceptions.

            This immediacy is easy to miss in Gilbert Grape as it doesn’t rub it in your face like a city slicker might.  No, it goes about it in a quiet, methodical way, one that reminds me very much of sitting around with my dad and listening to one of his childhood stories.  It seems light and boring at first, but you slide into its protracted rhythm without realizing it, and soon you’re finding the quiet moments of humor, desire, and despair popping out in ways that seem impossible to miss.  You come to see that none of the people in Gilbert’s town are complacent.  Each brim with their own dreams and ambitions, things that gnaw away at them with the same ferocity as everyone else, even though their surroundings cultivate a feeling of sameness that beguiles the constant flux surrounding them.

            Gilbert Grape (Johnny Depp) is the quintessential small-town young man.  He’s unobtrusive and loyal, spending every day bagging groceries at the local store and caring for his mentally handicapped brother.  He must seem like something out a fairytale to Juliette Lewis’s Becky, who becomes stranded when her trailer breaks down as she’s passing through his town.  The attraction between the two is instantaneous, but each regard the other with some trepidation.  Gilbert, whose duties to his brother and family are a 24/7 commitment, doesn’t have the time nor emotional energy to spend on a relationship, while Becky is hesitant to believe a man like Gilbert can really exist.  Her wariness is assuaged in one of the film’s best and most understated scenes, when she responds to Gilbert’s admission that he’ll miss a former lover with a mumbled “Good.”

            This scene, which revolves around Gilbert’s fling with an older, married woman, is also indicative of how well Gilbert Grape handles the flaws of its characters.  While everyone onscreen has dreams, they also have faults that they are never judged nor condemned for.  That’s not to say that there aren’t consequences for their mistakes; in fact, they often come in such a devastating fashion that the whole film has a twinge of tragedy, but at the same time each are treated with such kindness and understanding that you’re encouraged to view even the most frustrating characters with a humane eye.

            This reluctance to judge, along with the film’s decidedly understated nature, may feel like tedium at times, like you’re stuck in a loop of mumbled, pent-up emotions.  It’s a familiar tone for indies, but one that fits Gilbert and his town like a glove.  This isn’t a case of adherence to genre standards, but an accurate and true representation of characters that are brought to tender life by an excellent cast.  Of course, many things do change, most of which are inevitable but still horrendously upsetting.  In the climactic scene with Gilbert and his family, they make a decision they can never turn back from, and an insert shot reveals just how far they’ve all come.  Given the circumstances, they seem lucky to have made it there at all.

Other Notes:

Ø  There are, admittedly, some overwritten moments.

Ø  Gilbert’s struggle to be a good person is admirable and rarely seen in film.

Ø  “I haven’t always been like this, either.”