Pawn Sacrifice (2015)

Score: 3.5 / 5

I've never been much of a Tobey Maguire fan, but this is one movie where all his little (or not so little) "isms" pay off in an effective manner. In Pawn Sacrifice, he plays Bobby Fischer, World Chess Champion and controversial public figure during the Cold War, with boiling energy and furious resolve. In fact, I was able to watch him so attentively precisely because he plays a character so distinctly unlikeable. In turns pathetic and maddening, Maguire spins a web of paranoia so convincing, it's almost hard to see that it's him and not the filmmakers at all.

And I admire Edward Zwick, but this is not one of his better films. Balanced between drama and thriller, it's too intimate to be Big Picture and too funny to be thrilling. Its rather ostentatious title suggested that this might be this year's The Imitation Game, subtle and harsh with an eye to poignancy. Rather, it feels like a knockoff of that film, but this time with more American silliness and an obnoxious protagonist. Not a good trade. On the other hand, Maguire is playing by a different set of rules, apparently taking his hint from Black Swan or last year's Whiplash in his single-minded stab at weighty character acting. Not that he hasn't tried that before.

Mad props must be given to his co-stars, however, who marvelously parry his every word with generosity and humility. Michael Stuhlbarg and Peter Sarsgaard wonderfully support the action and the pathos of each scene, while Liev Schreiber looms in opposition to Maguire's mania. It's not a showcase for anyone but Maguire, though, who does what we can with his unstable character in volcanic eruptions of high-pitched yells and popped-out veins.

Zwick does manage to succeed in one way The Imitation Game failed: the action of his lead characters and the tone of the film are reflected wonderfully in the "footage" of the period. We see the mobs, hear the music, and get a good look at both American paranoia and European anxiety as they interact with our characters. I think this device works better here because it's presented as media, which it is, and the media already play a large part in this story. Zwick makes it work, and as someone who had no idea about the chess world or Fischer's apparently famed existence, I certainly benefitted from it.

One more thought. I mentioned Whiplash earlier, and that hints at something else I find curious about Pawn Sacrifice. Whereas the former film effectively educates the audience on the world it presents -- that is, even if you knew precious little about music, the film is not difficult to understand in musical terms -- the latter does not. In fact, there is little dialogue describing the game, and even less screen time devoted to depicting the nuances of play. Rather, I think Zwick tries to use chess as a not-so-subtle metaphor for the psychological war between nations during the Cold War and the various subterfuges and feints involved. Taken further, I wonder if he is trying to make a statement about the war, perhaps trivializing the global drama into a single board game that is taken far out of context, disguised in rich trappings, and played by mentally ill divas.

But that might be giving him too much credit. I think this movie is more face-value than that.

IMDb: Pawn Sacrifice

Everest (2015)

Score: 4 / 5

I fell into my own trap. I have preached before about not putting much stock in trailers and letting the film speak for itself, regardless of its claimed genre. When I first saw the trailers for Everest, I was expecting this year's Gravity, a daring, dark venture of cinematic novelty, great camera work, and heightened allegory. But as I walked out of the theater, I confess myself disappointed because it was none of those things. It's a damn fine film, to be sure, but it wasn't what I had anticipated. So don't do what I did.

So what is this movie? It's a good old-fashioned (by which I mean the genre reached its peak in the mid-2000s) disaster movie. In terms of plot, it's straightforward and formulaic: competing groups of climbers attempt to mount Everest (beg pardon) and due to a bizarre series of mistakes and happenstance, almost everyone dies. Is that a spoiler? I don't think so. Why? Because the movie is also a good old-fashioned biography, detailing the infamous real-life 1996 expedition. And what if it's not as spectacular as I might have expected? There's a lot to be said for a thriller this well-crafted and independent of CGI.

The real heroes of this film are all behind the scenes. Yes, it might be worth seeing for the great and varied cast (including the amazing Jason Clarke, Emily Watson, Michael Kelly, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Josh Brolin). But I applaud first the writers for so effectively capturing the many characters, places, and events of those few days. I never once felt confused or disconnected, which is saying a lot because I have trouble with names and faces. Credit must also go to director Baltasar Kormakur, whose passion for this project is unmistakable. Any big-budget filmmaker could have gone with the wind here, and really amped up the special effects (as I expected he would), but Kormakur is far more interested in creating a distinct tension between human willpower and the might of the mountain. Early in the film, Jason Clarke's character, the leader of one climbing team, describes the horrors they will face on Everest, and he climaxes by saying that above a certain altitude their bodies will literally be dying. I think the director relished in that concept.

In fact, the first part of the film is more of an adventure drama, and a rather uplifting one at that. We hear about the characters' dreams and motivations for climbing, we see them working together and overcoming obstacles. It is not until they reach their mountaintop experience that all the mistakes they have made along the way return with a vengeance. That's when it becomes a full-fledged disaster movie. And yet, despite the horrors we see on screen, Kormakur keeps his eye trained on closeups of his actors, making the human drama as spectacular as the occasional wideshot of the mountain's grandeur. He also keeps his eye on excruciating detail, which I didn't even realize until the credits began to roll and we are presented with photos of the real characters during their doomed expedition. Hair, costumes, and even poses are perfectly replicated, and every single scene of the film is tagged with a time and location. At first I found this device obnoxious, but it further proves Kormakur's passionate endeavor to accurately portray the real story.

It's entertaining, it's informative, and it's ultimately haunting. I could go into a lengthy argument about the integrity of art and my ambivalence toward movies that try to accurately depict reality at the expense of poetic transcendence. But I won't, because Everest never really tries to be anything but an honest look at a group of people who wanted a mountaintop experience, and how their efforts culminated in absolute tragedy. Hold on to something.

Oscar season is coming in fast and hard, guys. This one's a sure contender for sound mixing and editing.

IMDb: Everest

Black Mass (2015)

Score: 3.5 / 5

I guess it's officially Oscar season. Johnny Depp ushers us in with an early grab for Best Actor that is easily his best performance in years. Depp plays Whitey Bulger, infamous gangster lord of South Boston, with a monstrous intensity that transforms the character into a devilish force of nature. He disappears into the role, aided by excellent makeup, and transcends the film around him. If nothing else, see this movie for Depp. His chilling, bulbous blue glare is entrancing on screen, and he injects venom into every word he speaks.

The rest of the film is a solid crime thriller, to be sure, but not one I found to be very palatable. We are given precious little insight into Bulger's character, and indeed we are given only shallow and fleeting peeks into the plethora of other characters. Rather than appreciating the scope of the story, I was having trouble keeping tabs on everyone (not helped by the fact that they are all white men in business suits with thick accents discussing a lot of proper nouns that hadn't yet been established visually). The script is immense, spanning several years, locations across the country, and tons of characters; handled well, this type of script can be effective (remember David Fincher's Zodiac?), but here it buries itself in details and names and motives. Whole subplots come and go with seemingly little logic (whether the fault of the writer or the director), and the editing occasionally feels forced and awkward.

That's not to say there aren't shining moments. The performances are solid all around, notably in Joel Edgerton, who has to share several intense scenes with Depp, and in Julianne Nicholson, who shares only one scene with Depp that will probably give me nightmares tonight. Benedict Cumberbatch, Kevin Bacon, Peter Sarsgaard, Corey Stoll, and Juno Temple all pop in for a few scenes, which is fun if nothing else. And the lengthy, expository dialogue sometimes gives way to brutal gems, usually delivered by Depp, that often tore me out of my reverie.

Speaking of reverie, I should mention that Masanobu Takayanagi's cinematography is really excellent (he also helped shoot Babel, Eat Pray Love, Silver Linings Playbook, and State of Play), alternating between closeups of our lead actors' faces and grand stillshots of larger, usually remote locations. Though most images are in stark grayscale and in bleak lighting, Takayanagi frames his shots so that even an abandoned alley or the muddy underside of a bridge look as important as a cathedral. I think someone decided to pay attention to the title. Elegant and almost Gothic, his camerawork gives an engaging and hypnotic energy to the film that I found endlessly intriguing.

It doesn't have the heart of The Town, the sweeping grandeur of an epic like The Godfather, or even commentary on politics or violence like we might see in The Drop or Public Enemies. And watching it, I didn't really care what happened to these people because director Scott Cooper didn't seem to either. But as the last ten minutes came to a strange sort of climax (underscored by a haunting symphonic melody), I realized that the movie works in levels beyond those conventions. It's just an examination of a man's life. Gritty and bleak, the film makes us intimate with a gangster and his methods, including his liaisons with the FBI, and then leaves us with the weight of his sins (and ours, by extension) to contemplate as we leave. If the filmmakers wanted to undermine the cathartic and spiritual (confession/redemption) convention of recent crime dramas, they did so, and this black mass consistently piles on the heavy stuff with no hope for absolution.

IMDb: Black Mass