Sully (2016)

Score: 3 / 5

There are two good things about this movie. The first is Tom Hanks. Though he is uncharacteristically quiet here, he does great service to his real-life counterpart, the stoic Captain Sullenberger of the famed "Miracle on the Hudson". His nuanced performance won't garner him many awards, but it's definitely worth a watch, if only as a sharp change from his melodramatic verve in Captain Phillips (2013). I'd say Aaron Eckhart is the other good thing about this movie, but he's not in it enough to achieve that recognition. Actually -- and I can scarcely believe I'm typing this -- Clint Eastwood's direction is pretty good. To clarify: Eastwood and his cinematographer Tom Stern imbue the film with such fabulous atmosphere that it often feels as though we are present. Given the chilly setting, thrilling disaster, and even the icy demeanor of our protagonist, the filmmakers have fashioned a movie saturated with blue hues and a distinctly IMAX-like visual approach. Smart move, guys.

Other than that, the latest Eastwood film is typically underwhelming. The six minute flight that made global news would seem to take center stage in this film, and while it does make up the "spectacle" portion of the proceedings, the heart of the film lies not with facts but with propaganda. Eastwood's libertarian worldviews seem to have, yet again, overcome his artistic sensibilities, amping up the NTSB investigations and turning them into such a circus show that I half expected Richard Gere to drop from the ceiling in sequins, crooning about razzle dazzle. Think I'm wrong? Read Sullenberger's memoir.

Before you crucify me for not permitting artistic license, I'd like to point out that I am always in favor of stretching source material, and for making necessary changes in adaptations. However, those changes have to serve the story, and the only thing Eastwood's changes serve is his own mistrust of governmental oversight and his glorification of brave white men. Captain Sullenberger was a hero, to be sure, but Eastwood didn't need to create a villain for him to battle. In fact, Sullenberger wrote highly of the NTSB, saying that he felt "buoyed" by their encouragement and their determination that he and his copilot had "made appropriate choices at every step". What Eastwood fails to recognize here is that the NTSB is also a hero; he sees its investigators as clowns, malicious fools wrapping their victims in red tape, clueless and petty in their investigation.

Maybe the real crime I'm angry about here is that Eastwood totally squandered the opportunity he had in casting Anna Gunn as one of those investigators. That could have been lovely.

The shallow story and stoic characters would have worked fine for the relatively short running time, but they still felt stretched too thin. By the second half, Eastwood allows the bizarre pseudo-courtroom drama to wallow in excess and melodrama, which doesn't come close to meshing with either the titular character or the story up to that point. That's not the only way in which Eastwood and writer Todd Komarnicki fail us, however: They also can't get a grip on the basic narrative structure. We are pulled back and forth in time, forced into a strange limbo where the trauma of the flight is revisited upon us time and again, each time seen from a new perspective. After about the third time, it feels like the film is just spinning the one good idea it has, hoping that each time it will stick a little more.

The scenes of the crash itself are pretty darn good, but we've also seen it before, and better. Remember United 93? Remember the first episode of Lost? Again, Eastwood masters his atmosphere in these scenes, and perhaps the most memorable bit is the chanting of the flight attendants, "Brace! Brace! Brace! Head down, stay down!" That effectively aroused gooseflesh on my arms. The other scene that stuck with me was the opening scene. Sully, viewing the Manhattan skyline, as a passenger plane careens through the towers before crashing and burning into a metropolitan building. It's only a fever dream of his -- what could have happened to all those lives on January 15, 2009 -- but it heralds a film in which Eastwood promises he won't be playing it safe.

And then he plays it as safe as he possibly could have.

Is it a bad film? No, and it's worth a watch. Just be aware that Eastwood is up to his usual tricks, by which I mean the film is almost dull. Be aware that it's not an accurate representation of reality. Be aware that in casting Tom Hanks in a movie about a real-life hero, Eastwood has ensured that this film is a feel-good, tension-less escape from an exactly opposite political climate.

IMDb: Sully

Concussion (2015)

Score: 4 / 5

I really liked this movie. It's not nearly as good as it tries to be, but it does several things that I think deserve a lot more attention than they're getting.

First let's start with the basics. This is a melodramatic biography film that centers on the life work of one Dr. Bennet Omalu, a Nigerian-born forensic pathologist who researched brain trauma in football players and fought the NFL's efforts to silence him. Of course, all this is based on reality, and I can't say much about the factual basis for any of this, because I don't football.

Concussion, though perhaps misnamed, focuses on the efforts of Dr. Omalu and the effects of his fame/infamy on his personal life. Will Smith. Yes, Will Smith -- and I can't believe I'm saying this -- gives an amazing performance. Sure, maybe his accent falters here and there, ringing a little thin when it counts (not unlike Chris Hemsworth's faulty Nantucket effort), but it doesn't take long before you realize that the character's accent is one of the least important things in this movie. Smith imbues his eccentric character with idiosyncrasies and nuances that left me speechless, only to then add layer upon layer of unbridled passion and compassion. He captures first your attention and then your heart, and he carries the film with grace and finesse. Bravo.

A few other high points, shall we? David Morse delivers a heartrending performance as Mike Webster, a tragedy of the sport who incites the main plot when he dies in disgrace at only 50 years of age. Our protagonist uses Webster's fame and fans to repeatedly declare that football is killing people, even as the memory of Webster remains fresh and vivid in his psyche.

And then, of course, there are my favorite elements of the film. Though it is structured as a typical sports drama, its primary antagonists come from the highest levels of the sport in question. The NFL is presented as a sort of ubiquitous, monolithic Goliath, while our hero-David is a doctor. A foreign doctor. Who speaks differently. Who acts differently. This isn't another "Oh, he's black, but he's the same as us, I get it" discussion. This is a "Oh, he's not American, but he's in America and he's trying to destroy an American institution, but he's smart and kind and right" discussion. Timely? Hell yes. I love the little moment when Dr. Omalu's comrade says that he'll be an American hero: But you're not even American? Even better. (I should note that the often-repeated use of the identifier "American" is a little overkill, but it's not as bad as certain other words we might hear in theaters this week).

The supporting actors are all solid, no question there. But the plot suffers from being a little too unspecific. It seems that, in trying to be sweeping and grand, the film loses some of its footing and begins to tumble in a chilly Pittsburgh breeze. And it falls into a few shallow pitfalls of the genre, namely toying with a thriller-genre subplot, such as when Omalu's pregnant wife Prema attempts to evade a car seemingly tailing her, or when their phone rings with (presumably) yet another hate-call and the lights dramatically shift and they look at each other like the killer's in the attic. I get why the filmmakers included these bits, but it takes away from the face-to-face drama when Smith's character confronts his adversaries.

It feels a little weird, seeing this movie in the last stretch of Oscar season, but then this Oscar season is just generally weird. It started too early, it's ending too late, and there was a lot of trash in the mix. As far as Concussion goes, it's a melodrama, for better and for worse. It's a streamlined, straightforward story, and it tries to be more artful and important than it is. But it's also timely and daring, two qualities I would not expect from a "sports drama", though I'm not sure that's even an accurate descriptor here. It's a feel-good movie, and yet ultimately it left me feeling worse (which is not a bad thing here!). Because this problem is happening now. Because the wealthy owners and the quasi-religious spectators are so fervently determined to let the game go on that they don't care about murder. Because, overblown as it may sound, we in 2016 America enjoy throwing our strongest men into arenas to attack each other while we watch and cheer. Because we enjoy watching heroes get "jacked up", and we ridicule them when they stumble, and we forget about them as they die.

Even as Dr. Omalu celebrates his victory, he sees young kids playing football on a field. And he knows that he will continue to perform autopsies on those battered bodies that America tosses aside.

IMDb: Concussion