Self Made (2020)

Score: 3.5 / 5

Okay, it's not a film, but this is my blog and I can review whatever I want.

Self Made is the fascinating story of Madam C.J. Walker. I didn't know it was fascinating because I didn't know who she was, and so this miniseries works best by opening the door to historical knowledge. Madam was the first woman who became a self-made millionaire in America. She was also Black. And this series relies on her vision, resourcefulness, determination, hard work, and gumption to inspire and educate. It's also eminently approachable by someone, like me, who admittedly doesn't know who Walker was, doesn't really understand business, and doesn't know much about hair care (especially for black people). That's what got Madam Walker to the top.

Played by the inimitable Octavia Spencer, Madam C.J. Walker becomes iconic, the sort of larger-than-life historical figure you might see featured in an Oliver Stone movie. She begins in squalor as Sarah Breedlove, working hard as a washerwoman and having nothing to show for it, looking a bit of a mess as a way of life. Then she begins to lose her hair. After getting treatment -- in what feels a bit like a con but proves to be legit -- from a "magical" hair tonic, Sarah's life changes. The hope and joy in her wide eyes when she recognizes the opportunity to help other women in her shoes is infectious; Spencer's gifts as an actress stem from an uncanny ability to dominate the scene and reach out through the screen into your heart. Sarah determines to change her world, and starts by seeking a partnership with the only woman she knows who works with black women's hair: Addie Malone, played by Carmen Ejogo.

This is where things get a bit tricky, both in terms of the protagonist's life and in terms of the story being told in Self Made. The episodes touch on issues of black people's hair without really meditating on the powerful symbolism and culture of it. Addie is notably light-skinned and could be described as a "tragic mulatto" in the story; she wants to defend the ground she has earned but is unwilling to share her efforts or wealth with the shorter, darker, older Sarah. A few snide jabs about selling to people who want to look like Addie and not Sarah is all it takes for the latter to take things into her own hands. She steals Addie's formula and improves it, expands it, and develops the start of an empire with her husband and daughter in tow. She changes her name and slowly transforms into the Madam of history.

Because it is a four-part miniseries, we can safely assume the producers and writers wanted some drama, and so the two middle episodes creak a bit under the weight of interpersonal drama. Walker's husband (Blair Underwood), feeling emasculated and forgotten by his entrepreneur wife, embarks on an affair. Her daughter, Lelia (a wonderful Tiffany Haddish), is quietly revealed to us (not to many others) to have a lesbian lover. These inclusions are mostly predictable and feel too melodramatic; even though I know precious little about business, I found myself increasingly curious about how, practically, Walker was building her empire. I wanted to learn more about her actual work and the real issues she faced as a black businesswoman.

And then there are the frequent run-ins with Addie that turn bitchy one-liners into emotionally brutal, if repetitive, suggestions of superiority based on their relationships to men (including a disturbing few scenes with Booker T. Washington), money, hair, and of course skin color. And while some may criticize this dramatization of colorism as central to this story, I can't help but think it's an important discussion to continue having, especially in the historical context of the early 1900s. As a result of these scenes, though, Addie comes across almost as a cartoon villain, following Walker around the country and waiting for her next opportunity to pounce; Ejogo is brilliant, though, and plays the role with electric energy.

And while it may not be the most historically accurate series, there is something powerful to be said about dramatizing important figures in history that many of us may not know about. After all, last year's Harriet was the first major movie about Harriet Tubman, a hero every single U.S. kid learns about in elementary or middle school. Kasi Lemmons, who directed that picture, directs the first two episodes of Self Made, and uses her wonderful flair for fantasy to let us inside the mind of Madam Walker. With an eccentric soundtrack of modern R&B, hop-hop, and also some oldies and even spirituals, Lemmons makes sure we know this is all meant to be accessible and fun. Some of my favorite scenes depicted showgirls dancing and displaying her products, a boxing match with bright lights, and similar daydreams that bring to vivid life the fantasy life of someone so driven to success that they occasionally lose touch with reality.

The series spends all its time focusing on Walker's rise -- appropriate for a story with a title that implies its focus -- and so could be said to perform a disservice to Walker's legacy. Why aren't her incredible social contributions, political messages, and extensive philanthropy mentioned until some text and photos at the end of the series? But this isn't a historical treatise, nor is it meant to be the be-all and end-all statement of a full life lived. This is perhaps best shown in the series finale, as fireworks launch overhead and the black women in the crowd look into the camera to describe their own amazing accomplishments. And I, for one, am really happy to see a damn good story about Black empowerment utterly absent of the influence of white helpers, authority, or intervention. This series is meant to be as inspiring as it is entertaining, and the little bit of education it provides is certainly not a bad thing.

 

Roman J. Israel, Esq. (2017)

Score: 3 / 5

Roman J. Israel, Esq. should have just been titled Denzel, because a) nobody can remember its actual title and b) he's the best part of it.

Roman Israel J., Esq. is a character drama of the highest caliber. Delving deep into the consciousness and conscience of an impossibly complex character, the film revolves around its titular protagonist (Denzel Washington, in a mesmerizing performance) as he works to save his job. He's the behind-the-curtain brains of a two-person law firm until his partner (and former professor) has a heart attack. Taking over, Roman finds that his firm is broke and that it had engaged in some morally bankrupt deals. His idealism wounded, he begins to work for George Pierce (an impeccably dressed Colin Farrell) and he uses his knowledge on a case to collect reward money for identifying a killer. With his newfound wealth, he attempts to live the life he has long denied himself: he goes on dates with a beautiful woman with similar passions for justice (Carmen Ejogo), he leases a fancy apartment, he buys stylish suits.

J. Roman Israel then becomes a clear-cut morality play, and by the time a heavy-handed touch of fate sends consequences his way, Roman's time begins to run out. Until this third act gets a little too contrived, the movie is as excellent a character drama as you are likely to find. Of course, it's also a twisty legal drama that never quite allows its elements to coalesce, much less take flight. And by the time this weird and thrilling climax happens, we're left wondering why there was so much ado about so little. This ending is the kind I'd expect from a real-life story, one that allows its denouement (as the movie does) to succeed where its tragic hero failed, to show that his life was not in vain and that justice prevails. I half expected to see text about the real life Roman and the impact his work had on the justice system. But, of course, this whole damn thing was fictional.

Maybe Esq. Israel Q. Roman would have worked better for me if it were all a thriller, instead of just the climax. Maybe it should have been a pure character study and cut out some extraneous scenes and characters. The movie soars when Washington and Farrell square off: Pierce is exactly the sort of rich bitch Israel hates in the business, and as they butt heads they also rub off on each other. Ejogo, though playing the part as well as she can, can't overcome a screenplay that does her character no favors. Early in the film she was pragmatic and strong, but her speech to Israel during their date is almost absurdly uncharacteristic, wallowing in compassion and sentiment. Similarly, there is little to no sense in Israel's gamble to finger a crook and collect the reward money, and there is nothing as astonishingly stupid as Pierce tailing the hitman out to shoot Israel. Why do these characters suddenly do ridiculous things? You might say money, you might say friendship. I say, poor writing.

For me, Roman Esq. Jr. missed its mark. But it might work for you. There's certainly nothing wrong with seeing Denzel showing his acting chops or Colin showing his beauty for a couple hours. If you want a razor-sharp character study that thrills and chills and rips apart institutions, do yourself a favor and go watch Nightcrawler. That was some fine Dan Gilroy work.

IMDb: Roman J. Israel, Esq.

It Comes At Night (2017)

Score: 4.5 / 5

As a mysterious plague ravages the world, one small family has holed up in a remote house in forested foothills. Mourning the loss of their patriarch "Bud", his daughter, son-in-law, and grandson remove the body from the premises and burn it in a shallow grave. The disease (if that is what it is) is apparently highly contagious, and the family redoubles its quarantine. One night soon after, they catch an intruder, desperate for water and shelter, whose family is hiding nearby. Once these newcomers arrive, however, the dynamics of these survivors clash and sorely test the bonds of family and of civilization.

It Comes at Night, the second directorial venture from Trey Edward Shults, is an absorbing work. The definition of minimalist, the film reminds us that in our age of live-streaming and big-budget digital effects the most horrifying things are often what we don't see. In fact, it feels less like a feature film and more like a play: long shots, deliberately stretched dialogue and scenes, almost entirely taking place within a small boarded-up house in the hills. In fact, the only "spectacle" in the film comes, as the title suggests, at night, in the form of hallucinatory dreams had by the protagonists' son. He dreams of his dead, diseased grandfather coming to him, boils on his face and black goo pouring from his mouth. The whole thing is quite Shakespearean, if not as articulate.

The problem is, this film thinks it's up to more than it is. It certainly provokes lots of thought and discussion after viewing, if the clan of middle-aged women huddled in the aisle of my theater was any indication. And while it serves up no small amount of atmospheric tension and psychological horror, this film almost never thrills or chills. Maybe it doesn't have to. Certainly true horror doesn't rely on gore or bogeymen, but this movie leaves us with so very little to hold on to. What is this plague? How is it communicable (because several people contract it, and we have no idea how)? Is it local or global? And, the most frustrating to me, what exactly is it that comes at night?

Maybe most of those questions are unnecessary. We've seen perhaps too many plague/zombie movies already, and Lord knows we can imagine the proceedings well enough by now. Perhaps, too, Shults is emphasizing an esoteric or even symbolic ailment: More than once in the family psychodrama we suspect that paranoia, suspicion, or violence are the real disease, and by the end, I for one felt that possibility was more than justified. By the end of the climactic fight scene, you will too.

Then again, I consider other independent horror masterpieces of the last couple years, especially It Follows and The Witch, both of which we might consider minimalist. They don't answer the questions they raise, and their titles are as ambiguous. I'm left, though, wishing that the horrors of It Comes at Night were a tad more fleshed out. Maybe my real problem is with the title. What comes at night? The plague? The intruder? Paranoia? At least It Follows has the decency to embody "It", even when its precise identity is negligible. I guess the filmmakers wanted my consternation, and to provoke spirited conversation. I wonder, too, if with these themes Shults isn't trying to tap into the horrors of our current sociopolitical climate. Aliens arriving at night, "others" stealing our food and water, violence threatening domestic order, medical disaster, apocalypse and its aftermath; there are reasons, you see, that Joel Edgerton's character had stockpiled and reinforced his remote rural house, and certain characters have certain ethnic texture and color.

Ultimately, the filmmakers leave us satisfied if curious, engaged but unnerved, and moved yet bewildered with a masterful chamber piece of anxiety. It may not be a new horror staple, but it's a hell of a flick.

IMDb: It Comes At Night

Alien: Covenant (2017)

Score: 4.5 / 5

It's still one of the best franchises out there.

Alien: Covenant, despite its title, is a fitting continuation of the series that re-invents itself as often and as well as its titular villain. An awesome, roller coaster of a movie, it exhibits pitch-perfect sci-fi horror with expert pacing and awesome production value. It feeds off the energy that this series exudes so well, and leaves us craving ever more (thankfully, Ridley Scott has indeed promised at least two future films). Though attempting to connect its title to the iconic 1979 Alien classic, the film bears far more resemblance to the 2012 prequel Prometheus. Of course, it's a direct sequel to that film, also starring Michael Fassbender, taking place not long after the end of Prometheus (about 15 years, if my notes are correct).

Though Prometheus was criticized by some for its existential themes and broad metaphysics, I found it to be the most engaging of the series, after of course the deeply disturbing original. It gave us that disgusting alien-monster C-section scene, don't forget! Covenant similarly pushes the body horror and does so as befits a sequel: more often, more intense. It also -- though it seems many critics are telling us otherwise -- continues and builds upon the existential crises in its themes and plot. In fact, I found parsing through the mysteries it raises far more engaging than any violence and blood on screen.

It's the same story as all the others in this franchise. A colony ship (yes, the stakes are much bigger here), after suffering malfunctions, receives a signal from a nearby planet and goes to investigate. they discover a seeming paradise, even better than the world they had intended to colonize. Soon the exploration crew discovers a crashed ship, and their attempts to unravel its mystery are paralleled by their desperate fight for survival against vicious, bloodthirsty alien monsters.

How does it differ from the others, then? I don't want to spoil too much, but there is some we can safely mention here. David, the synthetic aboard the Prometheus survived the crash of his and Elizabeth Shaw's hijacked Engineer vessel, as did the black liquid bioweapon he used to destroy that expedition. On this new world, he has continued his experiments with it, though the film fails to explore the many questions that raises. Why did the Engineers create it, or did they create it? Were they going to use it to create life or destroy life? David has been attempting to use it to fashion an ideal form of the iconic alien monster, but still we're not sure why or to what end. We see some o his experiments -- or what we assume are his experiments -- including pod-like flora whose spores float through the air and "impregnate" the humans with the beasts. Later, after David has revealed his experimentation with a type of insect that lays its eggs in a host to be cannibalized, we see a room of eggs we recognize as the Xenomorph eggs, but where did they come from? How did David make those eggs without a Queen? Which came first, the Alien or the creepy slimy egg?

Maybe I was reading too far into it, or not far enough, but the film seemed to raise as many questions as it answered. It makes sense, narratively, of course, but it seems Scott and his team are deliberately withholding some information, some ties between ideas and films that might assuage our anxiety and fill in the blanks (not plot holes, mind, just blank spaces). Of course, even the next film may well answer all; the ending of Covenant is so arrestingly disturbing that most of the audience in the screening I attended stayed long after the credits started rolling.

It's a fabulous film. Enough gore and suspense to sate the horror fans, enough mystery and awe to absorb the sci-fi geeks, and enough action to satisfy those early summer blockbuster cravings. It keeps us the feminist punches, gives the queer theorists even more to chew on (and fret over), and does it all with a knowing wink and some new-fashioned razzle dazzle.

IMDb: Alien: Covenant

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016)

Score: 4 / 5

Nervous as we all were about this new venture, Fantastic Beasts proves itself worthy of its notable talent and high expectations. Sure enough, this is no Harry Potter, and it has little in it worthy of much comparison. Whereas the Potter series thematically concerns itself with death, friendship, courage, love, and hope in its coming of age narrative, Newt Scamander's new series seems (at least from its initial installment) more interested in empowerment and autonomy, cleverness and kindness, multiculturalism and diversity, and just a dash of environmentalism. As you might be wondering, yes, this is about as timely as we could want.

It's also unabashedly fun. Eddie Redmayne's Newt is immediately lovable, sweet and quirky, lost in his own mind (and, often, briefcase). Apparently an ex-Hufflepuff, he finds himself quite alone in New York City in the early 1920s -- during the reign of terror of one Gellert Grindelwald -- having come to America to release one of his prize pets in its natural habitat, Newt knows precious little of the Jazz Age and American magical culture. We experience his awe at the detailed cityscape, replete with bobs and pinstripes, speakeasies and typically ignorant No-Majs (the unfortunately named Muggles this side of the pond). While Newt seems all too ready to reveal himself to a No-Maj named Jacob (the scene-stealing Dan Fogler), the ruling magical body MACUSA strictly enforces the secrecy and submission of its citizens. When Jacob inadvertently releases several magical creatures from Newt's care, an ex-Auror named Tina and her sister Queenie get involved. Together, they recapture the lost animals in lovely mini-adventures around the period city.

Of course, JK Rowling couldn't make the film so simple. So in addition to the mesmerizing period detail, she deftly sets up a dual plot, laying down only the skeletal tracks of the latter to, presumably, be fully realized in subsequent films. The second plot concerns young Credence Barebone (Ezra Miller), an abused orphan whose adoptive mother (Samantha Morton) preaches publicly for witch hunts. Her bigotry and violence may seem a bit cheap to those of us familiar with the likes of Bellatrix Lestrange or Dolores Umbridge, but its blatant cruelty stand out in the otherwise buoyant film as impeccably timely.

The film's allegory for empowerment of suppressed culture is made perhaps most abundantly clear in young Credence, a character who is ultimately described as a Squib, but whose repression at the hands of his abusive mother has created a dark force of destructive power, the very force that has been wreaking havoc on the city. Percival Graves (played to perfection by Colin Farrell), a chief Auror, has secretly made Credence his informant through false promises and one of the most chemically intoxicating seductions of the year. Handsome, charming, and single-mindedly Machiavellian, Graves seems hellbent on discovering the violent spirit spreading chaos across the city, and when he does find it, his intentions for it become alarmingly clear only just before his disguise is stripped away.

Dressed in impeccable Colleen Atwood originals, Colin Farrell steals the whole movie away. He looks like a sort of Cruella deVille, and his presence onscreen is at once pleasing and fearsome. His only rival in show-stopping glory is Carmen Ejogo as Seraphina Picquery, President of MACUSA, though the film doesn't use her nearly enough.

What else can we say? The film moves almost too fast at times, and it will require multiple viewings to get all the references and Easter eggs. Watch out for news headlines, names bandied about, background creatures, and a certain symbolic necklace, to warn you about just a few. It's so packed with visual magic that, at times, the film feels anything but magical, and the action gets airy and inconsequential. The movie doesn't delve much into any backstories for the characters or even American culture, and it spends a fair amount of time setting up what will surely be the narrative trajectory of any subsequent films. While the film's obvious pandering to its target audience may cause us some irritation, there can be no doubt that seasoned director David Yates is fully in his element. His awareness of style and heart have few matches in modern big-budget cinema.

IMDb: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them

Selma (2014)

Score: 5 / 5

One of the most direct, intelligent films I've seen on racial politics in twentieth-century America, Selma is also one of the best films of the year. It doesn't preach quite as much as last year's big winner 12 Years a Slave, and it isn't as overtly sentimental as most films with a message. Ava DuVernay directs with crystal clear compassion and understanding, paired with an aggressive sense of narrative rhythm. She demonstrates time and again her willingness to show all aspects of her story, which makes her collaboration with her lead actor that much more interesting.

Driven by a fierce and engrossing performance by the incredible David Oyelowo, the film follows Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., as he works in Selma, Alabama, to overcome racial inequality and bring voting rights to the desegregated South. But King, for all his eloquent fervor and passionate dreams, isn't depicted here as anything but profoundly human -- complete with uncertainty, self-doubt, and exhaustion. We see firsthand -- literally, as the camera often takes to the street riots with handheld urgency -- exactly how King worked in both private and public life. And we see that his dreams have yet to come true in our own culture.

DuVernay and her team (notably cinematographer Bradford Young) brilliantly pull no punches, but they also carefully set up the film to allow for the countless parallels of social injustice in our own twenty-first-century country. And I don't just say that because John Legend and Common's credits song "Glory" references Ferguson. They not-so-delicately pull back the curtains on white privilege and the system of white power enshrined in our political and social institutions. Perhaps the most concise scene in this respect is when Annie Lee Cooper (played by the amazing actor Oprah Winfrey -- there, I said it) attempts yet again to apply for voters' registration. Or perhaps it's when the governor (?) played by Tim Roth discusses the Selma marches with president Lyndon B. Johnson (Tom Wilkinson) and blatantly reveals his racist agenda but receives no explicit reprimand. Or maybe it's when white preacher James Reeb (Jeremy Strong) who joined the marches is brutally and fatally attacked by white supremacists who declare that "The only thing we hate more than a nigger is a white nigger." In all these scenes and more, the filmmakers' sense of urgency and honesty make this historical drama quite thrilling and its message all the more critical.

IMDb: Selma