Category: Nominees – 1990s

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Few Good Men – 1992

This was a good movie that had the potential to be great, but it lacked something that might have helped bring it to that next level.  It lacked mystery, a fact which I’ll cover in greater detail in a bit.  The broad strokes of the plot were predictable.  But it was the powerful performances of the star-studded cast that saved the film from simple mediocrity.  Well-known names like Tom Cruise, Jack Nicholson, Demi Moore, Kevin Bacon, Kevin Pollak, and Keifer Sutherland came together to show off their skills.  There were even a few supporting roles by actors who were not famous at the time, but became famous later like Noah Wyle and Cuba Gooding Jr.

This was as courtroom drama, plain and simple.  When a U.S. Marine stationed at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba is killed in a routine hazing, Moore, playing Lieutenant Commander JoAnne Galloway, a military lawyer, believes that it was the accidental result of an illegal order called a “code red.”  The purpose of the “code red” order was to, by giving an incompetent soldier a beating, force him to become a better soldier.  However, the fact that the assault was an order meant that the real culprit was a commanding officer, not Lance Corporal Dawson, played by Wolfgang Bodison, and Private First Class Downey, played by James Marshall, who carried it out together.

Wanting to defend Dawson and Downey, Galloway pursues the case which is assigned to Lieutenant Daniel Kaffee, played by Cruise.  He is a smart-mouthed hot shot who also happens to be brilliant.  Pollak plays Kaffee’s assistant, Lieutenant Sam Weinberg.  The commanding officers of the two soldiers accused of the murder are Lieutenant Kendrick, played by Sutherland, and Colonel Nathan Jessup, played by Nicholson.  And finally, the prosecuting attorney, Captain Jack Ross, is played by Bacon.

And there’s the set-up.  The details are all revealed at strategic points to foster some tension.  But as I mentioned earlier, the plot’s broad strokes, while interesting to watch, were predictable.  I knew pretty much how it was going to go, and I was not disappointed.  At first, it seems to be an open-and-shut case.  But then as a few more details are learned, it becomes more complicated.  The defense has a rocky start, but the lawyer becomes passionate about the case.  The prosecution seems to have an unbeatable case.  The defense becomes discouraged and believes he is going to lose.  But then, a surprise witness steps forward, or a crucial piece of evidence is revealed and the defense attorney cannot walk away because he believes he is doing the right thing.  In the end, the case gets escalated and more and more people are put on the witness stand until the main bad guy loses control and confesses everything.  The defense wins!

It all sounds pretty stereotypical, doesn’t it?  And it was.  Only the setting and the details were different.  We follow the investigative process of Kaffee, Galloway, and Weinberg.  We are told everything they are going to do before they do it.  We are also clearly shown that the bad guy, Jessup, is guilty, not even allowing us to wonder about his guilt before his breakdown in the courtroom.  I think Roger Ebert said it best when he said, “The film doesn’t make us work, doesn’t allow us to figure out things for ourselves, is afraid we’ll miss things if they’re not spelled out.”

But while I’m on the subject, that final reveal which gave the movie its big memorable quote, the one that has made its way into pop culture vernacular, was wonderful to see in its proper context.  “You can’t handle the truth!”  Nicholson’s performance was fantastic.  He played the part of a man who was so passionate about his job as a military officer that he could easily be called a fanatic.  He is a megalomaniac who believes that he has the most important job in the world, keeping the citizens of the United States safe from harm.  He is therefore completely infallible and undeniably justified in any and every action he takes.

Nicholson had that perfect jar-head attitude.  He was so used to being obeyed that he was actually confused when he was not.  One scene that stood out to me as awesome was when Jessup arrived in court.  He immediately attempted to establish his own dominance over the entire court-marshal trial by belittling Kaffee and demanding that everyone recognize his rank.  But then the judge, Colonel Randolph, played by J. A. Preston, put him in his place by letting him know that it was his courtroom and he was in charge, not Jessup.  Loved it!  I also loved his reaction the result of the trial and Jessup’s arrest.  Nicholson’s inspired portrayal was just phenomenal.

But I would be remiss if I didn’t give proper credit to Cruise, Moore, and Bacon.    Sure, they were a little cookie-cutter but that was not the fault of the actors.  It was the script.  The point is, that despite the outrageousness of the actors and their personal personas like Cruise jumping up and down on Oprah’s couch or Moore’s box office bomb, 1996’s Striptease, for which she was paid an unprecedented $12.5 million, they are very good actors.  There is a reason why Hollywood keeps putting them on the big screen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Crying Game – 1992

This was a very good movie with a small but competent cast.  It is about Fergus, played by Stephen Rea, a man with a generally kind heart who gets involved with the Irish Republican Army.  He and his fellow soldiers, Peter Maguire, played by Adrian Dunbar, and Jude, played by Miranda Richardson, kidnap and hold for hostage a black British soldier named Jody, played by Forest Whitaker.

Fergus is assigned to guard Jody, but being a good man, he feels sympathy for and befriends him.  During their brief friendship, Jody tells Fergus of his girlfriend Dil, and gets him to agree to protect her after his death.  But when it comes time to murder him, Fergus cannot do it and lets him run.  Unfortunately, Jody runs into the path of a British tank and is instantly killed.

Fleeing the British attack force and his fellow IRA companions, Fergus goes to London to seek out Dil.  She is a hairdresser who also sings at a local bar.  Without telling Dil of his involvement with the IRA or his relationship with Jody, Fergus pursues her and falls in love with her.  But here is where I have to spoil the movie’s big twist.  If you plan on watching the movie, stop reading this review.  But I have to go into it because it is what turned the film from good to great.

As Fergus and Dil become closer and form a strong emotional bond, it is revealed that Dil is actually a man living as a transvestite.  Now, even though I had never seen the film, I already knew this plot twist, so I was expecting it.  But it must have been quite a big shock to the audiences of 1992.  First of all, they were very shocking in how it was revealed.  The audience finds out in the same way that Fergus does.  Dil takes off a robe and is completely naked.  Fergus is looking up into her eyes, and the camera slowly begins to pan down, following his gaze.

We see her bare chest, but it isn’t immediately apparent what the absence of breasts means.  But as soon as Fergus, and the viewing audience for that matter, is confronted with Dil’s manhood, his reaction is immediate and extreme.  He slaps her across the face and runs to the bathroom to vomit into the sink.

OK, so that was the big reveal, the big shock.  But what I found even more interesting and perfectly portrayed was the fact that Fergus quickly realizes that his emotional connection to Dil was strong enough to make him stay and explore his own boundaries in regards to his sexuality.  He could have just run and never looked back.  But he didn’t.  He had fallen in love with Dil, and was comfortable acknowledging his feelings to himself.  He went out of his way to protect her, even when his old IRA buddies show up and threaten to hurt his girlfriend if he doesn’t assassinate a local judge.

The script was so well crafted and engaging.  It had some great characters and some top-notch acting.  Stephen Rea was nominated for Best Actor at the Oscars, though he did not win.  His performance was subtle, but it was right for the character.  Fergus was a quiet and deeply emotional man.  But he habitually kept those strong emotions inside.  He was clearly uncomfortable displaying them.  Rea’s subtle, and one might say emotionally understated performance was absolutely appropriate.

I also really liked Forest Whitaker as Jody.  His screen time was fairly brief, but he is an incredibly skilled actor and he got the emotions of a man who knows he is going to be executed just right.  Miranda Richardson was also pretty good, and I especially liked her death scene.  I also have to mention a little-known actor who had a minor part as Fergus’ boss at his construction job.  Tony Slattery, who I mostly know as a comedian, played the part of a real jerk, the kind of guy nobody would want to work for.  I also liked Jim Broadbent as the bartender Col.

And lest I forget, Dil, played by Jay Davidson, did a great job as well.  He was incredibly convincing as a woman, as opposed to, say, Dustin Hoffman in Tootsie.  He did it without any wigs and if you didn’t know he was actually a man, you might only guess if you were really paying attention.  Unfortunately, I knew he was a man before watching the film, and knowing what to look for, I didn’t get the pleasure of the surprise twist.

Still, it was a great movie with an ending that I’m still trying to decide how to interpret.  Dil saves Fergus by preventing him from going through with the assassination.  Then she shoots and kills Jude when she comes looking for Fergus.  And so, to protect Dil, Fergus takes the blame for the murder and goes to jail for a six year sentence.  Dil is Fergus’ only visitor during his incarceration.  Fergus clearly enjoys her visits, but he continues to show lingering signs of discomfort with his own feelings for her.  Still, I liked that Dil promised to wait for her man.  But did Fergus love her out of a sense of obligation to Jody?  Maybe at first, but by the end, I think he actually loved Dil.  I’m not sure if he felt the same romantic love as her, but it was undeniably love of a sort.  So, happy ending, right?  Right.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Prince of Tides – 1991

I was really surprised by this film on more than one count.  First, I have never been a fan of Nick Nolte.  In my head, I have always had this unfounded, preconceived notion that the actor was just a real jerk.  I don’t know why, but I have always instinctively avoided watching his films.  But after watching The Prince of Tides, I think I might have an idea as to why I can’t stand him.  It is because he is such a good actor.

I’ll explain.  I don’t like dealing with people who are easily angered or people who, when they become angry, display anger so intense that it is almost frightening to see.  Unfortunately, Nolte is an actor who can go from zero to one hundred at the drop of a hat, and his emotions seem completely real.  I instinctively react to such raw emotion and become angered in response.  He has a facial expression of fury that looks far too natural on him.  But Nolte portrayed far more than anger.  There was a full range of emotions that were fueled by a powerful story, and Nolte turned in a memorable performance.

I speak mostly about him, but I can’t ignore Barbara Streisand’s performance as his leading lady, and the movie’s director.  The plot had several surprising revelations that propelled the narrative.  It took place in two different locations, South Carolina and New York City.  Nolte played Tom Wingo, a man whose life is on the verge of falling apart.  He has no job, and his marriage seems to be floundering.  He carries an unimaginable amount of emotional baggage because of a wildly dysfunctional childhood.

Tom’s twin sister Savannah’s latest suicide attempt forces Tom to reluctantly travel to New York to help her psychiatrist, Susan Lowenstein, played by Streisand, to delve into her past.  As Tom and Susan try to figure out why Savannah has tried to kill herself again, Tom effectively dredges up his own ghosts.  And all the while, a subtle romance begins to develop between Tom and Susan.

And that brings me to the second thing about the film that really surprised me.  I loved that the film devoted just as much time to Tom and his emotional journey as it did to the romance.  It was subtle and yet completely visible.  As the film’s director, Streisand took her time developing the relationship between them.  It was beautifully done, and when, near the final stages of the film, they finally jumped into bed, it was both expected and welcome.  It was never portrayed as something tawdry or taboo.  They were both married and they remained true to their marriages until it became clear that their respective spouses had moved on to other lovers.

That isn’t to say there wasn’t any flirting, but I respected Tom’s character because when Susan’s ever-traveling husband returned home, he stepped aside graciously and without apparent bitterness.  He only took Susan away after her husband went out of his way to humiliate them both.  When Susan asked him to take her with him, he did so without hesitating.  I also liked that there were a good number of flash back sequences in the film, depicting how messed up his, and consequently Savannah’s childhoods really were.  They had a brother, Luke, who had been dead for some time.  Their father was both physically and emotionally abusive, treating everyone in his house with cruelty.  And the mother wasn’t much better, rarely showing anything that might resemble love.

And then there was the event.  During one of the flash backs, Tom tells Susan of a night when three escaped convicts invaded their home.  Not only were his mother and thirteen year old Savannah raped, but Tom, himself, was also raped.  But that wasn’t all.  Luke came in with a shotgun and killed two of the rapists, while the mother killed the third.  Then, to make the whole situation even more messed up, Mom ordered her boys to take the bodies outside and dispose of them while she and Savannah cleaned all the blood off the walls.  All this was done before Dad ever got home.  Then the whole thing was just ignored as if it had never happened.  The scene where Susan guides Tom into dealing with his hidden emotions over the incident was powerful, and both Nolte and Streisand did such a great job with it.

Blythe Danner and Melinda Dillon did just fine as Tom’s wife, Sally, and Savannah.  Though Dillon didn’t have much screen time, I will always hold a special place in my heart for her for her great performance in one of my favorite science-fiction movies, Close Encounters of the Third Kind.  Susan’s son Bernard, was also a pretty important character.  He was played by Streisand’s real-life son with actor Elliot Gould, Jason Gould.  Bernard develops a paternal relationship with Tom, helping Tom to feel more comfortable with being a part of Susan’s life.

It was a well-crafted movie, and I have to give props to Streisand for some pretty great directing as well as some spot-on acting.  But again, I have to give credit where credit is due.  Nolte really did a phenomenal job.  I think that maybe I need to give the actor and his extensive body of work a second chance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

JFK – 1991

This was a good movie, but not, I think, for the reasons it was supposed to be.  Obviously, it is a film that is centered around one of the most tragic events in American history, the assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35^th President of the United States.  Most of this movie was supposed to be about the investigation that took place 3 years after the murder, carried out by Jim Garrison, the New Orleans District Attorney.  And it was.  But that story almost seemed like a subplot next to the facts concerning the assassination.

What I mean is that the structure of the movie was too much like a documentary.  It was almost 3 and a half hours long, and the most dramatic and interesting parts of the movie were about the event itself and not Jim Garrison’s investigation of it.  And the scenes that were devoted to the investigation had some poorly written dialogue, a slow pace, and a bloated sense of self-importance.  It was as if Garrison’s story was used as nothing more than a vehicle for the film makers to show the viewing audiences the amazingly suspicious facts surrounding JFK’s death.

That being said, there were some good performances.  Kevin Costner played Jim Garrison, the man in charge who is obsessed with the investigation.  His Assistants, Michael Rooker, Laurie Metcalf, and Wayne Knight as Bill Broussard, Susie Cox, and Numa Bertel.  Sissy Spacek played Jim’s wife, Liz.  Gary Oldman did a wonderful job playing the part of Lee Harvey Oswald.  Tommy Lee Jones played Clay Shaw, the main conspirator being investigated in the trial.  Joe Pesci, Kevin Bacon, Ed Asner, Jack Lemon, Walter Matthau, Donald Southerland, John Candy, Vincent D’Onofrio, and Jay O. Sanders all had supporting roles.  So it had a pretty big list of Hollywood stars.

Everybody played their parts well enough, except for Joe Pesci.  He is a good actor, but he started off one way, and ended up becoming his foul mouthed character from the movie Goodfellas.  I don’t know if this was intentional, or if he just forgot to keep the southern drawl we heard him speaking with in his first scene.

But the real star of the film was the assassination, which took place in 1963.  Director Oliver Stone did a pretty good job of mixing new footage shot for the film and real news footage from 1963 and 1966.  But it was the money shot that stole the show – the Zapruder Film.  That is the famous footage that clearly showed Kennedy’s head exploding.  You see, I found the explanation of the facts surrounding the assassination fascinating.  The film took a pretty solid stance, stating that Oswald could not have been the killer.  It looked at the story that the government had given the public and picked it apart in amazing detail.  It examined the event from every possible angle, interviewed eye-witnesses whose stories all told of shots coming from behind a fence, and put together re-creations.  All this was shown within the context of Jim Garrison’s investigation and court trial, in which he tried to prove Clay Shaw’s involvement in the assassination.

The most crucial piece of evidence to support Garrison’s case about the assassination being a conspiracy was the magic bullet.  The argument was made that in order for Kennedy to get wounded in the way in which he did from a single shooter such as Oswald, as well as taking into account the wounds of Texas Governor John Connally, the second bullet would have had to defy the laws of physics by doing things like pausing in mid-air and changing directions.  Thus there had to have been more than one shooter, which implies a conspiracy.  The film was based on two conspiracy theory books: On the Trail of the Assassins by the real Jim Garrison, and Crossfire: The Plot that Killed Kennedy by Jim Mars.  The film seems to believe everything the books had to say.

Incidentally, if you do any research into the subject, you’ll find that modern computer enhanced investigations have been made, and there are those who can proove how the magic bullet could actually have made all the wounds while flying in a straight line.   The magic bullet theory is only impossible if Connally was seated directly in front of Kennedy, facing forward.  But the Zapruder film clearly shows him turned half way around to look at Kennedy as he is grabbing at his throat.  This makes the lone gunman story seem very plausible.  But putting the magic bullet aside, there were too many other suspicious events surrounding the murder.  Was there a government conspiracy to assassinate Kennedy, or did Oswald act alone?  I’m not sure if anyone really knows.  But I personally believe there was.  Too many of the people involved died or disappeared to perpetuate the cover-up.

Anyway, Costner’s impassioned speech to the jury in his closing argument was moving.  And throughout the movie the common theme kept being reiterated.  Why on earth should we sit still and mindlessly believe a government that would lie to us?  That kind of government is not worthy of our trust or our loyalty.  And if we have to fight to get an honest government, then it is our duty to do so.  Actually, I found it a little heavy-handed, but that made it no less true.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bugsy – 1991

Bugsy is based on the true story of Benjamin Siegel, the Jewish American mobster known as, you guessed it, Bugsy.  Warren Beatty played the infamous criminal, who was known for being a particularly violent hit man who, after moving from Brooklyn to Hollywood, became involved in the original construction of the Las Vegas Strip.  I have to give Beatty’s performance some respect.  In my humble opinion, he was better here than in other films in which I have seen him, like Reds or Bonny and Clyde, not that there was anything wrong with those performances.

The beginning of the film was a little confusing.  It seemed to start in the middle of the story. The director, Barry Levinson, didn’t spend any time introducing characters or letting us know their relationships to each other.  He just skipped past all that and let the audience figure out who people were as they went along.  Of course, I knew who Beatty was playing, but I see him talking to Ben Kingsley.  Even after the film was over, I still wasn’t clear on who Meyer Lansky was, and he was an integral character to the plot.

Then Joe Mantegna shows up, and I soon figured out that he was a Hollywood actor, but I’m still unclear as to why he was associated with the violent gangster, Bugsy.  Elliott Gould makes an appearance as Harry Greenberg, but his screen time was so brief that I didn’t get a chance to figure out who he was or why he was there.  It was as if the movie expected me to know the real story of Bugsy Siegel, and all the people involved, before I watched it.

Well, Bugsy moves to California and when he sees Virginia Hill, played by Annette Benning, on a movie set, he instantly falls in love.  And it has already been established that whatever Bugsy wanted, he took.  He was such a well-known and feared mobster that he could walk into a wealthy opera star’s home and force him to instantly sell it to him for cash, right on the spot.  That seems pretty far-fetched, and I have to question it.  Did that really happen?  The answer is no, it didn’t, but it was a great scene for developing the character of Bugsy as an impulsive and intimidating loose cannon.

The film seemed to chronicle the rocky romance between Bugsy and Virginia.  They seemed to have an up and down relationship that kept coming back to a storybook love, one in which lies, deceptions, thievery, and infidelity seemed to be forgiven with ease whenever either one of them displayed an act of kindness or affection.  Her passion for him seemed to turn on and off like a light switch, implying that, in her own way, she was just as unstable as her lover.  But I liked that they showed how the character of Virginia had just as much of a colored past as Bugsy.  Her mouth was just as unapologetically foul and she did her share of sleeping around.  Benning played the part very well.

I also have to give a big thumbs-up to Harvey Keitel’s portrayal of Mickey Cohen.  We actually didn’t meet his character until we we’re well into the film, so he was introduced before we were expected to know who he was.  Keitel just has the fact of a mobster. He had the perfect look for the part, and I have always regarded him as an excellent actor.

So, as I do with most films that are based on reality, I did a little reading, just to see how much the movie got right, and what they got wrong.  Bugsy was, for the most part, true to history.  They got the personalities of the characters right, and the general facts about Bugsy’s involvement in illegal organized gambling, murders, and erratic, violent behavior.  But the biggest thing that the movie fictionalized was just how involved he was with the building of the Flamingo Hotel and Casino.  The film would have us believe that it was all his idea, and that he was solely responsible for conceiving the Vegas Strip that we have today.  In truth, the Flamingo was built by Billy Wilkerson, a man whom the film completely omits.  Billy was a famous entrepreneur who had nearly completed building the Hotel and Casino before Bugsy Siegel got involved.  Also, and this one is pretty minor, the film depicts Bugsy as being murdered on Christmas night, the night the Flamingo closed.  But in reality, he was murdered 6 months later.

The movie was a good movie with some pretty good acting.  I especially liked Keitel and Benning.  But if I had any complaints, I would have to say that it was two things: the film’s length, which goes hand-in-hand with its pacing.  It was too long and too slow.  The problem is that I’m not sure what I would have changed.  Beatty, who was instrumental in getting the movie made, and who is credited as being one of the producers, did a fine job of paying attention to historical details, and that is never a bad thing.  But maybe certain scenes could have been shortened to speed things up a little.  Maybe the whole sub-plot about Bugsy wanting to go to Italy to assassinate Mussolini could have been cut down or eliminated.  But then we might not have gotten to see a great little performance by Bebe Neuwirth, as Countess di Frasso, the wife of one of Mussolini’s friends.  Either way, the pacing and the length would really be my only complaints.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Beauty and the Beast – 1991

This film has the distinction of being the only fully animated film to ever be nominated for the Best Picture Award.  It certainly has its merits and is a good film.  It is one of those films that I have seen many times, but this time I watched it using a more critical eye.  In modern animated features, there is a lot of visible detail that can be seen because of computer generated animation.  But this was made right around the time when that kind of thing was still in its infancy, and most animation was still hand-drawn.  As a result, though most of the animation was very good, there were certain things that still looked… cartoonish.  But I’ll get to that in a bit.

Most people know the plot of the fairy tale, so I won’t go into that too much, but I will mention the great cast of voice actors that gave life to the animated characters.  Paige O’Hara took the lead as Belle, the girl with a heart of gold that longs for adventure.  She played opposite Robbie Benson playing the Beast, otherwise known as Prince Adam.  The egotistical Gaston is voiced by Richard White, and his buffoonish, sycophant sidekick LeFue, is voiced by Jessi Corti.  Belle’s father Maurice is voiced by Rex Everhart.  And then, the Beast’s three main servants, Lumiere, Cogsworth, and Mrs. Potts, are played by three well-known actors, Jerry Orbach, David Ogdon Stiers, and Angela Lansbury.

But despite its good qualities, there were most certainly inconsistencies in the animation that ranged from small innocuous things to glaring whoppers.  For example, we first see 5 steps that lead to the front door of Bell’s house, but are shown 15 steps in another shot.  Also, they drew Gaston as having clean boots in one shot, but as he props his feet up on the table, his boots are dripping with mud.   The one that got me was when Maurice is being thrown out of the tavern we clearly see an open doorway with saloon-style swinging doors, but then we are shown a massive wooden door covering the entrance in the next shot.  Did they think we wouldn’t notice?

Well, no, I don’t think most people would.  I only did because I was specifically looking for those kinds of things.  For the most part, it is simply easy to get swept up in the fantasy of the classic story.  And for all their faults, Disney knows how to put on a good show.  Not only was the story well crafted, but it is wonderful entertainment that is appropriate for the entire family, and in this day and age, that is saying something.  And thankfully, they didn’t rely on potty-humor despite the film’s obvious juvenile target audience.

So I realize it sounds like I am being very critical of the film, but there were plenty of good things that have to be mentioned as well.  For example, the voice actors were well cast, and the music was amazing.  In fact, Beauty and the Beast won the Academy Awards for Best Music, Original Score, and for Best Music, Original Song.  The songs were fun to listen to and easy to remember.  Great songs like Belle, Gaston, and Be Our Guest were highly entertaining with fantastic and energetic visuals.  But it was the movie’s title song that really seemed to steal the show.  Beauty and the Beast, sung by Lansbury, was beautiful and touching.  In fact, the entire scene stood out in a number of ways.  The lyrics of most of the rest of the songs in the film had very little subtlety or depth.  But this number was sweet and romantic.  It seemed to transcend the confines of the simple fairy tale and touch on greater themes.

And this scene was the film’s centerpiece in terms of animation as well.  Most of the movie was hand-drawn, done the same way Disney animators had always done.  But they took a chance with this scene, using a computer generated background through which Belle and Beast could dance.  And it is obvious when you watch it.  Suddenly the background had detail and a depth that were not in the rest of the film.  There was also a greater sense of realism, though it was clearly animated.  It really was an amazing sequence, and something that audiences had never before seen in a Disney animated film.  Unfortunately, it also had the side effect of making some of the hand-drawn animation seem primitive and cartoonish by comparison.

But I also have to address one of the biggest plot holes of the whole plot, one which the Disney script writers seemed to completely ignore.  Prince Adam has been the Beast for years, but it is established that the curse must be broken by the time he is 21 years old.  So he must have been cursed when he was around 13 or 14 years old, at most.  And we never see his parents, either in the prologue or the epilogue.  We do not see them as transformed objects either.  So we can only assume that the 13 year old boy was master of the castle without any parental guidance.  Of course he was spoiled.  And then, the enchantress who transformed him into the Beast proceeds to punish the all the inhabitants of the castle for the spoiled Prince’s mistake.  But I guess it served them right.  In the absence of the boy’s parents, they should have showed a firmer hand while teaching the Prince manners when dealing with scary old witches, despite what other Disney fairy tales like Snow White teach us about them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Goodfellas – 1990

Goodfellas was a better movie than I expected.  The problem wasn’t the movie, it was my expectations.  I was expecting a cookie-cutter, predictable film.  I expected the performances to be over the top and the story to be somewhat farcical.  But it was much more complex, and interesting than I thought it would be.  There was subtlety, humor, and a bit of emotion.  And for me, the most interesting part of the film was the fact that it was told from the perspective of a gangster who really loved being a bad guy.

The main character is Henry Hill, played by Ray Liota.  He provides a lot of narration that was good narration, in that it wasn’t blatant exposition that propelled the story.  It was narration that was told from a first person perspective, developing his character but letting the viewer hear his inner thoughts and feelings.  And it wasn’t until the end of the movie that I learned that it wasn’t simply his inner monologue.  The narration was actually a deposition, of sorts.  Henry Hill was telling the story of his career as a criminal with an air of fond remembrance and nostalgia.  He was in a witness protection program, and was no longer living a life of crime.  And it was clear that he missed it.  Such an interesting point of view.

Add to that the fact that it was based on a true story, and you have a very interesting peek into the mind of a bad guy.  He would continually go on about how much he loved the fast and dangerous life, the thrill of theft and high-stake heists.  He remembered his fellow gangsters with affection.  He loved the money and the women.  He loved the respect and the freedom to do anything he wanted.  Sure, he had to work with psychopaths and murderers, but it was a small price to pay for all the glory and benefits of a life of organized crime.

I loved the scene in which a young Henry is released from his first arrest.  He feels like he has failed because he got caught selling stolen cigarettes, but when he exits the courtroom, he is greeted by all his fellow gangsters with smiles and hugs.  The big boss, Paulie Cicero, wonderfully played by Paul Sorvino, spreads his arms and says, “Hey!  You popped your cherry!”  I had to laugh out loud for that one.

Now, Ray Liota did a great job, there is no doubt.  Especially in the later scenes when his cocaine addiction started becoming a problem.  But it was really Henry’s partner, Tommy DeVito, played by Joe Pesci, who really stole the show.  Tommy was a killer, through and through.  He murdered without a conscience.  He shot people on whims.  He had a deep psychological fear of being laughed at, and anybody who made fun of him in any way usually ended up dead.  The part seemed to have been made for Pesci.  He was so incredibly suited to the role.  He was sometimes hard to watch.  He made me uncomfortable, which is exactly what he was supposed to do.  He was supposed to be scary and Pesci played it brilliantly.  The iconic “Are you laughing at me?” scene was a lesson in dangerous tension.

The film’s other big name was Robert De Niro, Playing Henry and Tommy’s boss, Jimmy Conway.  Again, De Niro seemed to be a natural at playing the part of a gangster.  There is a natural toughness about him that is so believable on the screen.  His character was just as much of a killer as Tommy, but unlike that psychopath, he was not so ruled by his emotions.  He had a brain, but he also had a temper when his orders were disobeyed.

And, of course, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Henry’s wife Karen, played by Lorraine Bracco.  In fact, there were plenty of times when she would take over the narration, which made sense because she had to go into the witness protection program with her husband.  She was also perfectly cast.  She looked good and though she started off as an innocent woman, she had her dark side.  It was very telling about her character that when she first saw Henry use a gun to beat the crap out of someone who had hurt her, she said, “I know there are women, like my best friends, who would have gotten out of there the minute their boyfriend gave them a gun to hide.  But I didn’t.  I got to admit the truth.  It turned me on.”

But if Henry was such a successful gangster, why were he and his family in the witness protection program?  Well, his cocaine habit had gotten him into trouble and after Tommy had gotten himself whacked, Jimmy put a price out on Henry’s head.  So he did the only thing he could do.  He made a deal with the cops that put Jimmy and Paulie behind bars for the rest of their lives.  He testified against them in court.  And because he was the gangster that never actually murdered anybody, he was given a full pardon and the chance to disappear.

I’m still not a huge fan of movies that are overtly violent, and this movie certainly had its intense and gruesome scenes.  But Goodfellas impressed me with the great characters and its smart script.  Martin Scorsese, the movie’s director, did a good job and gave us a pretty well-made and memorable film.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Godfather: Part III – 1990

I’m going to start off by saying that I think this movie has got a bad rap that it doesn’t deserve.  The problem that it is, naturally, compared with the first two movies in the trilogy, and it just isn’t as good.  But that’s saying the third installment is an 8 instead of a 10.  But hey, it was still an 8!  I liked that it was a good story that could have worked, even if it wasn’t part of the Godfather Epic, but the fact that it gave us familiar characters that we knew and a history from the first two movies, just made it more enjoyable.

The movie did a great job of bringing back nearly all the original actors to reprise their roles, the only major exception being Robert Duvall.  He refused to take part in the film because, though he was not the lead, he felt he should get paid just as much as Al Pacino.  But Pacino, Diane Keaton, and Talia Shire, all returned, playing Michael Corleone, Kay-Adams Corleone, and Connie Corleone, respectively.  This time around, they were joined by Andy Garcia, who was awesome as Michael Corleone’s illegitimate nephew, Vincent Mancini/Corleone, and George Hamilton playing the character who replaced Robert Duvall’s Tom Hagen, B. J. Harrison.  Also, director Francis Ford Coppola’s daughter Sofia, played Michael’s daughter Mary Corleone.  His son Anthony, was played by the talented singer, Franc D’Ambrosio.  Throw in a few more mafia gangsters like Joe Mantegna as one of Michael’s many rivals, Joey Zasa, Eli Wallach as Don Altobello, and a few supporting roles played by recognizable names like Richard Bright, Bridget Fonda, Donal Donnelly, and John Savage, and you have yourself a pretty good cast.

The film was unique in the epic trilogy in that it was much more introspective than its predecessors.  The main plot was about Michael Corleone’s desire to get out of the organized crime business and go legit.  Unfortunately, his past sins, his past rivals, his past business partners, and his past resentments all came back to haunt him.  It wasn’t a simple matter of walking away.  Michael has become an old man with a long list of regrets trailing behind him, and the scorn of his beloved ex-wife in front of him.

However, Vincent was a young and eager man who had a temper like his father Sonny, who Carlo Rizzi had killed in the first movie.  And I thought it was cool that as a last effort to go straight and get back in Kay’s good graces, Michael claims Vincent as a true Corleone and hands his position as Don of the family to him.  Unfortunately, it was already too late.  There was already a contract out on his life.

I also liked that Talia Shire had a more prominent part in this movie than she’d had in the first two movies.  It was very interesting to see how Connie was just as much of a heartless killer as her brother.  Shire did a great job.  Pacino and Keaton also turned in some great performances, of course, but for me, it was Garcia that was really the stand-out of the cast.  The character of Vincent was strong and powerful, not always smart, but passionate.  He looked good, and he is a skilled actor.

But if he was the film’s main strength, then I have to point at Sofia Coppola as its biggest weakness.  It must have been difficult for her, an unexperienced actress who never really wanted to act, to be put next to the likes of Pacino, Keaton, and Garcia.  But… she just really wasn’t very good.  And I also learned that she only took the part after the several actresses, for various reasons, could not play the part.  Julia Roberts had scheduling conflicts, Rebecca Schaeffer was murdered, Madonna was deemed too old for the part, and Winona Ryder dropped out at the last minute.

Another interesting aspect of the movie was that it fictionalized actual historical events and cleverly made them a part of the story.  For example, (quoted from Wikipedia), “the ending of the papacy of Paul VI,the very short tenure of John Paul I in 1978, and the collapse of the Banco Ambrosiano in 1982.  Like the character Cardinal Lamberto, who becomes John Paul I, the historical John Paul I, Albino Luciani, reigned for only a very short time before being found dead in his bed.”

But many film consider the film’s ending, apart from Sofia Coppola’s poor performance, to be its weakest part.  And when I say its ending, I mean the last 10 or 20 seconds.  The big climax ended in which Mary is shot and killed.  Vincent shoots the assassin, and Michael and Kay are left, screaming over her body.  We see a montage of all the women Michael has lost during his years as a crime boss, including Mary, Kay, and his first wife Apolonia.  Then the scene cuts to Michael as he sits all alone in the garden of Don Tommasino’s villa.  He is very old, and very alone.  After a few seconds, we see his hand drop just before he slumps out of his chair and falls, face down, on the ground, apparently dead.  We see a few more ominous seconds of his lifeless body, specifically conscious of the fact that there is nobody around to help him or even notice his death.  Some say it detracted from that character’s grand and larger-than-life persona, but I thought it was an ingenious commentary on the wages of a life of sin and vice.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ghost – 1990

Ghost was a romantic supernatural thriller.  It was the highest grossing movie of 1990.  Whoopie Goldberg’s fantastic performance won her the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress.  The film spawned a Japanese remake in 2010, and a 2011 Broadway musical.  The pottery scene was so iconic that it has been parodied over and over again by more than 17 major television shows and movies. This was a good and very enjoyable movie, but I have to say, it really has a messed-up version of the cosmic justice system.

To explain that, here is a brief synopsis.  Sam, played by Patrick Swayze, and Molly, played by Demi Moore, are a young couple who are in love.  Their friend Carl, played by Tony Goldwyn, is secretly a money laundering criminal who hires Willie, a lowlife thug played by Rick Aviles, to steal Sam’s address book to help him in his fraudulent plans.  Willie accidentally murders Sam who does not go into the spectral heavenly light, but instead becomes a ghost.  Using his new ghost powers, Sam investigates his own murder and protects Molly from Carl and Willie.  To do this, Sam gets the help of Oda Mae Brown, a psychic medium played by Whoopie Goldberg.

That’s basically it.  But what this film says about the afterlife is… a little harsh.  You are either good or bad.  If you are good, you go to heaven.  If you are bad, you go to hell.  It is really a system of absolutes, using the concept of personal karma to judge a person.  If you do bad things in your life, you are doomed, so you better be good so you can go to heaven.  There is no ambiguity, no gray area.

I know I am oversimplifying the movie, but it is hard not to.  For example, what if Oda Mae’s character had died in the movie?  She was a con artist with a criminal record.  She didn’t want to help Sam and Molly, but Sam badgered her until she had no choice.  In the end, though, it became clear that she wanted to help Molly.  So if she had died, where would her soul go?  I know the film implies that she was actually a good woman, but what about all the people she had spent years swindling?

And what about Carl, who did die.  If you think about it, he was just a money launderer.  He never meant for Sam to get murdered.  And the only time he threatened Molly’s life was after Sam and Oda Mae had really put the screws to him by stealing 4 million dollars from him, putting him in a position in which his criminal partners would hunt him down and kill him.  He was desperate.  His financial crime scheme had spun out of control, and so he is doomed to hell?  Think about it critically.  Were his crimes any worse than Oda Mae’s?

Anyway, I have to take a step back and recognize that the cosmic justice system was, by no stretch of the imagination, the focus of the movie.  It was a romance, and the romance between Sam and Molly was well played.  The two had a good on-screen chemistry.  It was a thriller, and there was plenty of great suspense scenes, like the one in which Willie sneaks into Molly’s home, or when we see Willie trying to kill Oda Mae.

And it was most certainly supernatural.  When a good person died, the pure light that showed up to carry their souls to heaven was like an idealized version of unearthly glory.  But when a bad person died, shadow demons arrived to viciously attack the poor soul and drag him off, screaming, to eternal torment. It was pretty horrifying.

And while the ending of the movie was consistently sappy and romantic, it actually made very little sense.  So Willie and Carl die, Molly and Oda Mae are safe.  But then, as the heavenly light comes for Sam again, Molly and Oda Mae are able to see Sam’s ghost.  He says a last tearful goodbye to Molly and the two women see him walk off into heaven.  On the screen, we can see a line of luminous people who are waiting for Sam to join them.  Molly and Oda Mae are now first person eye witnesses into the afterlife.  And knowing that Sam is waiting for her in heaven, how could Molly ever fall in love with another man?  It would have made more sense to me if only Oda Mae had seen into the afterlife.  After all, it was already established that she had the supernatural power to communicate with the dead.   Molly did not.  But I think it was implied that because Sam was such a good guy, heaven was giving him and Molly a special gift.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Awakenings – 1990

I loved this movie.  It got so many things right.  It was highly emotional, inspirational, slightly sappy and sentimental, it had some really top-notch acting, a smart script, a perfect cast, and a beautiful message.  Both Robin Williams and Robert De Niro were wonderfully believable in their respective roles.  By the end of the film, my cheeks were streaked with tears.  It got me.

This was a film based on the true story of British Dr. Oliver Sacks, whom director Penny Marshall, of Lavern and Shirley fame, turned into an American, Dr. Malcolm Sayer, played by Williams.  He is portrayed as a brilliant research doctor who is so socially crippled as to be nearly on par with the patients over whom he is given charge.  They are victims of the 1917 – 1928 epidemic of encephalitis lethargica, which leaves the poor soul in a permanent catatonic state.  Right off the bat, the film is dealing with a sad subject which is emphasized by the beautifully melancholy score by Randy Newman.

Dr. Sayer seems to be a social cripple.  He lives a solitary life, doing his best to minimize any human contact.  Nevertheless, his obvious lack of social skills seems to be a benefit, given the nature of his patients.  He can talk with them and interact with them, but they cannot respond in any way.  Or can they?  Soon after taking their cases, he learns that though everybody seems to have given up any hope of reaching them in any meaningful way, they can respond to certain stimuli.  This inspired him to begin researching ways to help them.

Sayers began to believe that trapped inside his patients’ inert bodies, were normal, active minds.  The line that really encapsulated the dismissive attitudes of most doctors and scientists was chilling.  In a conversation with a fellow researcher on the subject, Sayers asks, “What’s it like to be them?  What are they thinking?”  Dr. Ingham, played by Max Von Sydow, replies, “They’re not.  The virus didn’t spare their higher faculties.”  Sayers asks, “We know that for a fact?”  “Yes.”  “Because?”  And Dr. Ingham’s reply was both ominous and frightening.  “Because… the alternative is unthinkable.”

His star patient is Leonard Lowe, played by De Niro.  De Niro was amazing, and I was shocked to learn that he didn’t win the Oscar for Best Actor for his stunning performance, though he was at least nominated.  The film actually started out showing Leonard as a child, as the debilitating disease slowly took hold.  With his mother’s permission, Dr. Sayer begins giving Leonard an experimental drug that miraculously brings him back to life.

The film follows Leonard’s amazing process of rediscovering the joy of being alive.  De Niro was fantastic as he portrayed a man who remembers going to sleep as a young child, and awakens as a 40 year old man.  The drug is administered to the entire ward and all the patients respond.  Leonard even meets a girl who falls in love with him.  It seems like a miracle until Leonard begins to show signs of returning to his catatonic state.  The movie is very effectively depressing as we watch him spiral back down into the grip of the disease.  As I said, De Niro did such a phenomenal job of portraying the fear, the courage, and the helplessness that the role required.

But another aspect of the film that I loved was the sub-plot in which, just as Dr. Sayer helps to bring Leonard back to life, Leonard, through his incredible struggle and friendship with Dr. Sayer, helps to bring him out of his fear of social interaction.  And the sweet ending that hints at a possible romance between the doctor and his head nurse, Miss Costello, played by Julie Kavner, was just a tenuous light at the end of a long dark tunnel.  It said that the movie wasn’t just about Leonard’s awakening to the miracle of life and love, but also Dr. Sayer’s.

But De Niro wasn’t the only one that gave a wonderful performance.  Williams was also amazing.  Much as in the 1989 movie, Dead Poets Society, he gave us a very subdued and intimate performance, which was in great contrast to his wild comedic performances and stand-up career.  He created a character who was almost painfully inept when dealing with other human beings, and yet he was likable and even charming at times.  It just made the hint of a relationship with Nurse Costello believable.

This was a wonderful movie and I would highly recommend it.  Leonard’s wonderful little speech which seemed to sum up the movie’s central message was inspiring and bears repeating here.  He said, “Read the newspaper.  What does it say?  All bad.  It’s all bad.  People have forgotten what life is all about. They’ve forgotten what it is to be alive. They need to be reminded. They need to be reminded of what they have and what they can lose. What I feel is the joy of life, the gift of life, the freedom of life, the wonderment of life!”  If that isn’t inspirational, I don’t know what is.