The Place Beyond the Pines: An emotional powerhouse of unstable ambition

The relationship between a boy and his father is a peculiar notion that frequently asks the age-old question, does the apple fall from the tree? Rebutting the perturbing idiom, director Derek Cianfrance’s film “The Place Beyond the Pines” tracks the journey of four men, stunt motorcyclist Luke Glanton (Ryan Gosling), police officer Avery (Bradley Cooper), and their respective sons, Jason (Dane DeHaan) and AJ (Emory Cohen).

Narratively executed in three isolated, yet inter-connected tales, the film’s front-running story, Gosling’s, packs an emotional punch that sets the bar too high to follow. Luke, a stunt motorcyclist for a traveling carnival, learns that he knocked up former fling Romina (Eva Mendes) on his previous tour. Growing up without a father, Luke attempts to raise the boy and reconnect with Romina, a difficult task made worse by her current boyfriend. Desperate for money, and coaxed on by fellow motorcycle fanatic Robin (Ben Mendelsohn), Luke begins robbing banks to support his family.

The emotional depth of Gosling’s story let alone his and everyone else’s performance, creates an emotional momentum that is almost unsuccessfully carried on by the film’s trailing acts. Picking up now with Cooper, a police officer struggling with corruption in his profession, the overall film takes an odd misdirection that seems to come way out of left field. While the events of the second act feature a terrific villainous performance by Ray Liotta, and an outstanding enactment by Cooper, proving an incredible range of versatility, the relationships between characters begin to fell more contrived and superficial. Even more so, when fifteen years later we meet Cooper’s son AJ, the typical substance-abusing "daddy doesn’t spend time with me" kid.

While the character of AJ, co-pilot of our third and final story, seems artificial, Jason, Luke’s son and our other protagonist, redelivers the emotional stride that his father established in the beginning of the film. In a haunting manner, the rippling effects of the father’s sins come alive in this act, delivering an emotional finale summed up in one single shot of the film.

Despite hindrance by the over ambitious attempt at telling three tales in one, “The Place Beyond the Pines” is a tragic film worthy of much praise. A testament to Cianfrance’s ability to shock his audience, the film is an absolute must see for those curious about moral ambiguity, placing cops and robbers on a similar grounding, and psychologically unpacking the tantalizing expression, “like father like son.”

Ryan McCabe is a student majoring in Film and T.V. at NYU.  As a student finding his way in the film business at one of the nation's best film institutions, Ryan brings a unique perspective to this blog and recently voiced the roles of Peter Godwin and Theron Campion In Ellen Kushner and Neal Gaeman's  audio book The Fall of Kings. 

Netflix Review: Safety not guaranteed

Probably one of the best games I like to play with my friends is that of hypotheticals.  I really can’t explain just how enjoyable it is to watch each other struggle as we ask ridiculous questions such as “who delivers the eulogy at your funeral?”, or the inevitable last person on earth questions.  It is thus no surprise that I greatly enjoyed Safety Not Guaranteed, a film whose premise could probably fit well within our game.

Wanted: a partner to travel with me back in time, ready for danger and knowing that safety is not guaranteed. The above is the gist of the personal ad placed in a regional newspaper that engages a journalist (Jake Johnson) and his interns.  It turns out that this ad is not a joke, and that loner Kenneth (Mark Duplass- pete from The League) really does believe that he will be time-traveling. Of course nobody believes this guy, and the piece is intended to be a nice bit of comedic fluff for the newspaper.  Chief journalist Jake , has clearly used the situation to try and meet up with a former flame and so his wonderfully sarcastic, cynical intern is sent to investigate this weird so-called time-traveler, by posing as someone interested in his ad.  Naturally, the dude is an absolute nut, but it’s ok mostly because Mark Duplass is just that right amount of crazy to be humourous while gently reminding you of the singing homeless people you sometimes run into on the street; the pain and loneliness of their existence having long ago pushed them over some unseen line.

What makes this movie work is that it’s charming and is light and funny in every regard. It’s not a serious dramatic movie, but yet is capable of moments of supreme clarity, all the while not pretending to be anything that it’s not. The film is pretty predictable in some regards  and yet feels a bit too simple- as though it could be replicated as some sort of made-for-tv-hallmark-special.  Luckily for us, the writing and jokes are extremely well written and very well-delivered. Duplass’ craziness is so well emoted- so well controlled, that I almost forgot that he is the same guy I watch in The League. His chosen time-traveling companion is also a delight- her deadpan humour fitting well in the dynamic of the film, with its jaunty but real approach fitting her on-screen persona rather well.

Safety Not Guaranteed is a great Sunday afternoon movie, a little independent movie that has no grand assumptions about it identity, but holds true to its promise, delivering powerful messages without making you feel burdened. In fact, it got me thinking about what I would do if I traveled back in time, and what I would fix. I’m not quite sure what that would be yet, but I know I have no regrets for having watched a truly wonderful film. 

42: "Good" can't be good enough for a great man

I love baseball movies and yet I hate watching baseball. Don't get me wrong, going to games and relaxing, eating peanuts with your friends and family and occasionally paying attention to any juicy bits of action is really nice,  but we're only a couple weeks in and I'm already sick of seeing a million identical diving catches on SportsCenter's top plays. But somehow, I have never quite had that problem with films about baseball, and so I was excited about the latest entry into the baseball film category- a biopic about the great Jackie Robinson.

For those of you who don't know (i.e. you were cryogenically frozen for the past sixty years) , Jackie Robinson was the first black man to ever play in baseball's major league. One of the best to ever play the game, Robinson became the catalyst for the diversification of America's pastime, serving as a hero to a whole new generation of black sport stars who would change the landscape of sports to what we know today. Robinson's struggle to be seen as an equal in a league that didn't want him , seemed to me to be fodder for a guaranteed home run (yes the baseball puns will be abound in this one), and I came into the theatre not questioning whether it would be good, but great.

Right off the bat, something about the presentation of the movie seemed a little off. Biopics tend to be all over the place in terms of how they introduce their subjects, and at what part in their lives we find them. Unfortunately, the way the beginning of 42 is handled, it felt more like I was watching a Ken Burns PBS Special on the Jackie Robinson Era. While the background on the era was appreciated, it seemed to take away the majesty that one often finds so often in baseball movies. In the following scene we we're taken to the pivotal moment where Dodgers owner Branch Rickley decides he wants to sign a black baseball player. Not only are the acted reactions to this announcement worthy of a middle school christmas program, but surely the screenwriter could have included a lot of the background information from the beginning in the dialogue. I wasn't there, but I'm pretty sure Rickley's staff had more to say than a muffled "you can't do that". I mean at least try something like "you can't do that, there's never been a negro in the major league... that's why we have the negro league". Boom. In thirty seconds worth of effort, the writing could have been that much better, and an out of place opening sequence need not have been shot at all.

Thankfully, the storytelling seems to go a lot better. The fact that much of 42 takes place when Jackie is signed to the Dodgers' feeder team and works his way up turns out to be a brilliant move, as it gives us time to get to know the central characters before some of Jackie's biggest trials are met. Harrison Ford is expectedly good as Rickley, although I don't think he is ever given enough material to really satisfy his justification for wanting to sign a black player in the first place. The acting by Chadwick Boseman as Robinson is sturdy, but by no means anything to contact the annals of history about. He is certainly no Jamie Foxx in Ray, or Sean Penn in Milk, but that's ok, because that's not the sort of movie 42 is.

42 is not daring or particularly life-changing, but it's not mediocre or irreverent either. In fact, I think it's only real problem as a movie is that it is perhaps a bit too focused on being accurate without using some of the historical tools at its disposal. Directors have long used the sanctity of America's pastime to produce philosophical forays into the American experience and there is perhaps no better launch pad to talk about the evolution of race-relations in the States than the story of Jackie Robinson. 42 never shies away from this, and does a fair job of showing some of what Robinson had to deal with, but it fails to drape its hero in the godlike fashion that we expect from great baseball movies and that he deserves. In fictional characters like Benny "The Jet" Rodriguez (The Sandlot) to Roy Hobbs (The Natural), we're given a myriad of figures who are rather human and commit godlike deeds as we watch in awe. Somehow, 42 has managed to take an extraordinary man who commands respect like a deity in his sport,  and made his accomplishments seem somehow less awe-inspiring, even though both your natural knowledge of the subject and the context of the film repeatedly tell you otherwise.

Baseball, in a classic sense, is all about the mythology, the superstition, the fear of being struck out and gunning for a homer all the same. But 42 seems to miss these elements, and in the end a promising hit turns out to be just another pop-fly, caught and quickly forgotten; everything that Jackie Robinson and his legacy are not.

A tribute to Roger Ebert

I scanned my facebook newsfeed this afternoon, and was delivered a small shock of sorts. Roger Ebert, the renowned movie critic and one of my heroes was dead. I knew this not from any "Rest in Peace" statuses (though there were many later), but rather from the simple changing of a profile picture by one of my friends. My friend Jake had the good fortune to meet Ebert at a book signing in Chicago a while ago, and the picture says it all; the grin on my friend's face matching the old gentleman's beside him. Ebert's smile of course wasn't nearly as voluntary as my friend Jake's - a malicious cancer that led to the removal of  his thyroid  in 2006 saw to that, but his eyes in the picture reveal a wit undimmed and a spirit stronger than ever.

The great Roger Ebert

I'm afraid it was this older and more frail Roger Ebert that I really knew of. Like most college students my age, I had been far too young to appreciate  Siskel and Ebert at the Movies, and living in England and Belgium with basic cable prevented me from watching any of his later T.V. shows as great as they were. Considering this and the fact that I never met the guy, one could question my having dedicated an entire blogpost to my thoughts on this man, but I would beg to differ. 

The Roger Ebert I knew of was a man who could no longer speak, but whose writing soared to heights that are only worthy of those forever remembered. As I became more and more interested in movies in high school,  it became a regular occurrence for me to look at one of his reviews soon after watching a movie I had enjoyed. There was something comforting about knowing Ebert agreed with you about a movie, and a weird sense of accomplishment when he didn't. Most of the time we agreed, and I would marvel at the work of a man who seemed able to take everything I had felt about a movie and make it into a coherent, funny and insightful review. Ebert could be erudite and showcase his knowledge of film without being too lofty or condescending, but never degraded himself to those two word quotes fit for airing on commercials five weeks before a film's release, that are clearly given on the way to some studio-sponsored free buffet. 

Above all, what made Roger Ebert so special to me, was that he was so much more than a movie critic. Whilst I loved hearing about how good or bad movies were, I read his reviews to try and piece together different parts of what was a truly fascinating man. Ebert, it seems, possessed an almost Forrest-Gumpian knack for being involved with all things Chicago. It was he after all, according to Oprah Winfrey, who convinced the icon to go into syndication in the first place. Towards the end, Ebert would entertain us, his fans, with tales of strange local bars, drunken interviews with classic movie stars, and his many views on life, all of which were always an amazing read. His opinions on things always came across as being so very genuine, all the while accompanied with devastating sarcasm and an incredible sense of humour. 

Ebert's determination to keep writing both for fun and for reviews even after the loss of his speech, is probably the greatest testament I can give to someone who has truly changed the way people think about movies. The man whose reviews and various publications I have followed for a few years now died today as one of the greatest critics and writers of his generation, and I am proud to have known of him if only for a short time of his life. 

Roger, it seems I hardly knew you, but know that your words have inspired me beyond measure to believe that one small, pudgy man can leave the footprint of a giant.