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drama

Capone – Josh Trank (2020)

  • drama

Not very well received this film about a 47-year-old Al Capone. Tom Hardy is the leading part was the main reason to watch it nonetheless.

I guess many people expected a “Scarface” type maffia film about Capone, while actually this film is a drama about the man’s last year in which he deteriorates rapidly.

Capone spent years in prison. At an early age he got syphilis which starts to seriously attack his nervous system. Capone gets so bad that he is allowed to leave prison and is place under house arrest. There he founds out that his family has serious financial problems and has started to sell items from the house.

Initially Capone is only not too mobile, but for the rest not too bad. It soon becomes clear that the decease also attacks his brain and the rest of is body. Capone’s paranoia starts to take over which results in a few strange dream-like scenes.

Word is that Capone hid a big amount of money somewhere, so everybody tries to pick the information about the whereabouts of the money from the rapidly fleeing memory.

“Capone” is mostly a drama. It has some grim humor partly about Capone’s situation. If you do not expect a maffia crime movie, “Capone” is actually a descent film.

Babel – Alejandro González Iñárritu (2006)

My girlfriend bought “Babel” quite a while back, but since I find Iñárritu’s films good, but rather heavy (at least, I remember them that way), I did not really feel like watching it.

And indeed, “Babel” is again somewhat heavy. Not a depressive tear-jerker, but certainly not a feel-good movie either.

There are different stories. Some are obviously linked, others only later prove to be linked with the rest.

First we have the inhabitants of a tiny Moroccan village in which two boys play around and make a awful mistake. Then we have the couple Richard (Brad Pitt) and Susan (Cate Blanchett) who are on holidays in Morocco when something terrible happens. There is also Amelia, an illegal Mexican immigrant in the USA who takes care of two white children. When her brother gets married in her home-country, she takes the worst decission of her life: she takes the children with her to the wedding. Also we follow the young and deaf Japanese girl Cheiko. Even though pretty, her disability gives her a negative approach to life. Forcefully trying to loose her virgity does not make life easier.

Iñárritu managed shows the wildly different cultures, the Mexican, the Japanese, the rural Moroccan, well. The obvious drama and stress around Richard and Susan brings tension to the film. The heartfelt psychological drama of Cheiko makes the film somewhat heavy.

Another good Iñárritu.

The VVitch – Robert Eggers (2015)

What did I miss? What is it that people like about this film? I get a bit of a “Midsommar” feeling. Another such applauded film that only worked on my nerves.

“The VVitch” is pretty boring. A very Christian family moved from England to the new world. The ideas of the father do not entirely work with the rest of the village so they move to a remote place in a forest.

Praying day and night, seeing the Devil’s work everywhere, the family works itself into the ground. The only positive thing is the presence of Anya Taylor-Joy. The story is boring, the acting is boring, there is no atmosphere…

I guess I missed something.

I, Tonya – Graig Gillespie (2017)

How big are the odds to watch two films of two different directors with the last name Gillespie in one weekend?

Tonya Harding likes ice skating as a girl. Her mother pushes her towards to becoming a professional ice figure skater. The mother is, let us say, persuasive.

Tonya is an all-American, somewhat lowlife girl. Her foul mouth she has from her mother. Because of this, no matter how good Tonya is, she does not really fit into the glamour world of ice skating. This causes her to not get the praise she deserves.

Then there some other elements in her life that do not really help her carreer.

“I, Tonya” is a documentary-like film with interviews and flashbacks. The remarkable story is told with harsh humor and gives a peak into the world of a perhaps famous, but certainly not a rich young woman trying to keep her head above the water in the world of professional sports.

Tesla – Michael Almereyda (2020)

Not too long ago but few people had heard of Tesla. Most of those who did probably did not know much more than images with lightening globes. Now that the rest of the world thinks that Elon Musk came up with the name of his cars himself, a biography of Nikola Tesla (1856-1943), the early experimenter with electricity has been presented.

I am not sure if I knew that Tesla lived in the USA most of his life. He even worked for Thomas Edison (played by Kyle MacLachlan!). Tesla is more innovative than Edison (in some ways at least) and the two have a deep-running dispute about AC versus DC.

Tesla finds new funds, continues on his own and his inventions and investigations become more and more radical. He not only thinks about electricity, but also global wireless communication.

The film shows Tesla as a closed man living inside his own head. When you see all the inventions that are presented, you start to wonder why Tesla is not better known today than he really is. It seems that other people made money and fame with Tesla’s ideas.

The film is a biographical drama with a few ‘out of place’ elements. Not wildy interesting, but not boring either.

I Don’t Feel At Home In This World Anymore – Macon Blair (2017)

Ruth is a nurse in a nursing home. In her boring life she becomes more and more annoyed by the selfishness of our time.

One day Ruth comes home and finds a burglar in her house. The police go about their routine, but do not really seem to want to try to help Ruth finding her belongings back. With a neighbour, Ruth starts her own investigation.

Ruth and Tony first encounter petty crime, but as their investigations continue, they move up in the chain. A bit of a “Fargo” type story unfolds. Anything that can go wrong…

“I Don’t Feel” is an amusing drama / comedy with some very black jokes.

Lucky – John Carroll Lynch (2017)

In spite of the last name, there seems to be no familial relationship to David Lynch and the director. You may know him as an actor though. That said, J.C. Lynch obviously dove into the world of David Lynch for his debut, picking long term Lynch actor Harry Dean Stanton for the leading part and David himself as an actor too!

Stanton is one of the actors who passed shortly after the finishing of the third season of Twin Peaks, age 91. In that last year he also managed to play Lucky.

Lucky is an old man living in a remote, Southern American desert village. He is a sight in his little town, walking around with his cowboy hat. In the film we see Lucky talking about life, his fear of dying, but mostly, we see a charming old man going through his daily routine.

“Lucky” is a slow, minimalist, slightly melancholic and beautiful drama.

Rest in peace, Harry.

Advantageous – Jennifer Phang (2015)

Gwen works for a plastic surgery company. She is the face of the company that is in development. Not only are they working on new techniques, but also on reaching a younger audience and Gwen is getting older. She is side-tracked and ready to be sacked.

Life is not easy and Gwen has problems getting by financially. The risk of becoming unemployed is especially burdensome because she wants her high IQ daughter to get a flying start in life.

Initially Gwen starts looking for other jobs, but when that fails, she volunteers to be one of the first test subjects of a radical new treatment.

“Advantageous” is a melancholic and intimate drama that plays in the (near) future.

The Professor And The Madman – Farhad Safinia (2019)

Oxford University has a long time wish to make a dictionary of the English language, but the project keeps stranding. At last they hire the outsider James Murray played by Mel Gibson.

Murray has no university degree. He is a self-taught expert in a stunning amount of languages. After some doubt, he can start is the project. He has some unconventional ideas. Instead of reading everything available in the English language to distill words, definitions and thus the development of the meaning of the word, he wants to use the general public to mail cards with words, meaning and sources so they can catalogue and cross-check them.

One of the volunteers is William Minor (Sean Penn), convicted for shooting a man, a mad, but otherwise brilliant man, with a lot of time on his hands.

The story may sound a bit dull, but actually the film is a very well done drama with an interesting story and good acting.

1922 – Zak Hilditch (2017)

Farming is Wilfred James’ life. He manages to marry the pretty Arlette to double his land, but in spite of a son, the marriage is not a happy one. Arlette has little with their hard life and wants to sell her father’s land and move to the city. Wilfred and son Henry prefer to stay on the farm.

The arguments get more and more bitter and when Arlette starts to make plans to force her plans, Wilfred starts to make plans to prevent this from happening.

The story is based on a novella of Stephen King, but has but little of the typical King horror elements. “1922” Is mostly a drama with a few horror elements. The story is not very surprising or even interesting. The atmosphere of the film is alright, but overall, the film is fairly dull.