Movie Review: Before We Go

Director: Chris Evans / Starring: Chris Evans & Alice Eve/ Writer(s): Ron Bass, Jen Smolka, Chris Shafer & Paul Vicknair. 

Before We Go is a drama/romance movie about two strangers, Nick Vaughan(Evans) and Brooke Dalton(Eve), who find themselves stranded in New York for the night with only 80 bucks and two non-functional credit cards between the two of them.

The film gets straight to the point opening on a trumpet playing Nick(Evans) in the bustle of Grand Central Station on a late night. He sees Brooke(Eve) storming, seemingly hysterical, through the station down to the subway, dropping and breaking her phone on the way. He chases her down to return it to her and finds out she's stranded in the city because her purse was stolen. Being the good samaritan he is, he offers to help her get home. Brooke is distrusting of Nick at first, she even gives him a wrong name. And that's fair, he's a strange man nearly forcing kindness onto her in the middle of the night. But as if his boyish charm & his disarming kindness didn't already let you know, there's a redemptive scene where he swoops up behind Brooke out of nowhere and throws his arm around her when she's heading down the sidewalk straight for a group of rowdy young men when god knows what was about to happen. It's creepy that he followed her, but you know what they say, the devil you know...

Nick is a man with a bubbly, easygoing personality but some of it is a facade to mask the scars of a past relationship. He seems stoic about it at first, but you later learn how deep his missed opportunity at love cuts. I'll admit, having just recently seen Evans in Age of Ultron as Steve Rogers/Captain America, it's a little hard to immediately separate him from that. Doesn't help Nick has that same upright demeanor to him as Cap, but Evans sheds the Marvel role here as well as he did in Bong Joon-ho's Snowpiercer. Brooke is "icy" as Nick put it, distant and solemn at first. As the night goes on her personality unravels, she opens up and you learn she's had some turbulence in her love life as well, though, more recent than Nick's. 

I haven't seen much of Alice Eve, I know her from Star Trek Into Darkness, though. She's really, really good in this role. She and Evans have fervent chemistry as two characters with a deep connection whilst in a haze over the love of someone else. Towards the middle of the film I was close to writing it off as a derivative of Lost In Translation, but the last act proves this is different from that. Yes there's the dynamic of two disillusioned strangers having a chance meeting against the backdrop of a big city(New York City is affectionately lensed by 'Like Crazy' & 'In Time' cinematographer John Guleserian) but Before We Go is a story that addresses its characters' problems directly. It doesn't offer an answer, because there's never a definite answer when it comes to things like this, but presents a strong notion about what the answer may be.

"You can't allow the people you love to determine how you love." is the most important piece of dialogue in the film and it offers what might be a novel point of view to some. It's spoken to Brooke, but it applies to both characters and anyone who's ever loved someone so to the extent that it makes them question themselves. Being in love with someone even though they're happy without you, still being in love with someone despite how much they've hurt you. That depth of love may not be fathomable to a lot of people, but then again... it might just be. This isn't about just laying down and being okay with those circumstances, though. It's about accepting those things as they are so you can move on if need be. 

"You have to be okay with not being okay" Nick says and he's right. Whether that be a missed opportunity at love or the prospect thereof... Ironically what may just be the case for the two characters. Chris Evans' feature debut behind the camera handles the expansive topic of love tenderly, but doesn't come off as sappy. It's kind of distracting that Evans is in the movie himself, but it's smart that started out small and used himself as draw. It'll be interesting to see where he goes from here. I remember a while back him talking about focusing on directing more.

Movie Review: Spring

Spring(2014)

Director: Justin Benson, Aaron Moorehead

Writer: Justin Benson

Starring: Lou Taylor Pucci(Evil Dead), Nadia Hilker, Jeremy Gardner(The Battery)

"Pick your poison."

I *think* I read about this over on thefilmstage.com. I do remember watching a little bit of the trailer then cutting it off after I got the gist of what it was about to avoid seeing anything that would lead to ruining the entire story. As I said before in my The Dead Lands review, when I hear/read a film is up my alley, I like going in knowing as little possible. I went into Spring thinking it was a horror. It turns out to be more than that. 

It starts out with our lead, Evan(Pucci), sitting beside his cancer stricken mother as she lay dying in bed. Not unlike many horrors. You know the ones... the lead has either just dealt with a tragedy or is still reeling from a traumatic experience in their past. For a minute it had me worried, but when the cops show up at Evan's house because he almost beats a guy to death in a bar forcing him to flee for Italy, the film takes a really, really good turn. He gets to Italy, there's a quick montage of him doing tourist-y stuff. And then he meets up with two Brits who seem like roughnecks at first, but are nice enough and invite him to go to the country with them and so they go to this beautiful, and I mean BEAUTIFUL town, Conversano I think it is, I only know from looking up the filming locations on IMDb, I watched this movie twice and didn't hear them say.

Evan and these Brits stay there for a few days, during the stay Evan meets a beautiful young woman named Louise(Hilker) at the bar, a local, who tries to seduce Evan, but turns around and cuts out when he asks her out on a date to try to get to know her. A few days go by and the Brits decide to leave, Evan stays behind and gets a job. He runs into Louise again and finally she goes out with him and they hit it off. There's a quote on the poster for the film that says "A HYBRID OF RICHARD LINKLATER AND H.P. LOVECRAFT." I've only read two Lovecraft books and I don't know, I could probably stand to read more to get a full grasp on the nature of his works, but from what I did read, he doesn't have much of an influence here outside of maybe some of the monsters? However, the former comparison to Linklater mostly rings true. Has all the elements intrinsic of his work(The Before trilogy mainly.) The fluid, subtle camerawork, the walk-and-talk motif & the naturalistic dialogue. Although, nothing particularly thought-provoking is said(mostly in Evan's case), the genuine chemistry between the two characters is definitely there. 

Pucci portrays a tortured, but surprisingly optimistic character in Evan. The guy has the absolute worst luck in the world, but still plays it down, what a trooper. Despite all of that I really didn't care for him. Thought he was bit pushy & badgering to be honest. I don't really know what Louise saw in him, but what do women ever see in us? And I could be surely reaching, but I think that's one of, if not the biggest, the themes of the film along with exploring some of the dangers women face in society, it also shows how big of deal it really is when what women start a family with a guy, just on a grander scale. And that's not to say Louise was "perfect" in comparison to Evan, because she could be impatient and dismissive at times, not to mention a whole lot of other things, but to say that women in general are amazing creatures(see what I did there? No? Just watch the film) that sometimes give up things to settle down and that's nothing to be taken lightly. 

Hilker plays a wise, free-spirit type well, but didn't care for her character much either. But together, Evan & Louise are great. Their banter, the flirting, moments of vulnerability they share, etc. Like I said, genuine chemistry between the two. The horror element  is there with some great VFX(CGI & practial), but I haven't said much about it because I don't want to ruin anything. Plus, even though I am a huge genre fan, I say it's only the second most interesting part of the story AFTER the romance. You can trust it's that good because films that focus heavily on romance don't usually impress me. All in all, it's good film. An intriguing genre splicer equipped with fangs, tentacles & claws, but most important of all: a heart.

Movie Review: Fifty Shades of Grey

Fifty Shades of Grey(2015)

Director: Sam Taylor-Johnson

Writer: Kelly Marcel (screenplay), E.L. James (novel)

Starring: Dakota Johnson, Jamie Dornan

"I don't make love, I fuck... hard."

I can pinpoint the exact moment I first time ever came into contact with Fifty Shades of Grey(rarity for me that my memory can ever be so precise.) It was back in 2012 when the book(s) first got hot, I hadn't heard anything about them then there was a skit about it on Saturday Night Live. The first time I really became familiar with the books was when my girlfriend was reading the trilogy, she'd tell about bits and pieces of it. For the ever so slight chance that you may not be familiar with this material, Fifty Shades of Grey is about an extended love affair between a shy, virginal college student Anastasia Steele & enigmatic billionaire(not really specified what for) with some dark sexual kinks, Christian Grey. They meet by chance when Anastasia steps in for her sick roommate to interview him for their school paper. Nothing new, archetypal fantasy-romance. Girl meets vampire billionaire-boy, they fall in love, but something keeps their romance coming into full bloom. What could that be? I'm sure that the key demo for this film weren't watching for that question, but, to me, it's the most interesting part of it.

There's fireworks as soon Christian & Anastasia meet. He sits behind his desk looking over to her and she's flustered I take it because she finds him to be handsome? To be completely honest, his face looks like a potato to me, but hey... this is the guy. Couple that attraction with his cold, domineering presence and you can tell it's even harder for her to contain herself by her stammering and avoiding eye contact. There is definitely chemistry is here, but it's not in the dialogue because that's one of the worse parts of the film. Setting the trend for the rest of the film, this scene in his office is all is all visual stimuli; the piercing stares, quick shy glances, the pencil biting, desk grabbing, etc. It's foreplay. And that subtle lust-filled tension spills over to after the interview ends when Christian walks her to the elevator, it looks as if he wants to take her right then and there. The elevator doors close and Ana hastily bursts out of the building washed with wave of relief... a contrast to her clumsily falling into his office. Even more sparks fly the next time they meet when Christian pops up at her job(creepy much?) at a hardware and buys rope, tape & cable ties. Here another trend is set for the film: Christian's creepiness. At the counter when he's paying for his things, after he agreed to take pictures for Ana's friend's article, her male co-worker, Paul, comes up behind her asking if she needs him to bag the items for her(when they're already in the bag.) Christian looks at the guy like he could kill him(to be fair, he did unnecessarily touch her.)  If it wasn't clear before that he wants her, it is now. It's also clear that her already sees her as his.

At the photo shoot Christian damn near interrogates Ana asking if she's involved with the photographer or her co-worker. She assures him she isn't. Afterward he takes her for coffee and things come to screeching halt when she mentions she's a romantic. He tells her he's not the man for her and that she should steer clear of him. It plays like a breakup scene which feels premature when they JUST met like two days ago. That same night Ana goes out to a bar with her roommate & the photographer. She gets tipsy and drunk-calls Christian who, even more possessively sounding than when prying into her dating status, says her he wants her to go home, asks where she is, and eventually says that he knows where she is and is coming to get her. Shortly after that, Ana stumbles out of the bar with the photographer trailing behind her who acts like he has good intentions, but really just tries to come onto her while she's inebriated. Christian pops up in just the nick of time to snatch her away... one creep combating another. The next day Ana wakes up in Christian's hotel room to new clothes and room service. Christian walks in, draped in sweat, he takes his shirt off and says "if you were mine, you wouldn't be able to sit down for a week." and she's like "What?" then he seductively(I guess) bites the toast right out of her hand. She asks Christian why she's there and he replies, as robotically as humanly possible, that he's incapable of being away from her. Ana says "Then don't." and we're off to the races.

Here begins the best and most interesting part of the movie; not the fantasy ride Christian takes Ana on with the helicopter, the big penthouse or the steamy sex that's undoubtedly catered to the female gaze(not saying there's anything wrong with that.) Next to Seamus McGarvey's beautiful & narratively involved cinematography, it's the emotional tug-of-war between the two that compels. After Christian tells Ana that he doesn't do romance he eventually shows his playroom famously known as The Red Room of Pain. He gives her a glossary of BDSM terms & tools and offers her a contract to be his sub which outlines what's to be expected of her. He claims he wouldn't have sex with her until it's signed, but after she shows reluctance and admits to being a virgin, Christian in a creepy way, is turned on by her purity and ends up having sex with her anyways. The churn in the blending of their worlds that follows suit. For the rest of the film they go back and forth over her signing the contract, still having sex (I've NEVER been more tired of seeing a woman's breasts than after watching this movie.) And we see the two start to rub off on each other; To reflect Christian, Ana becomes more stylish, her sexual appetite grows, she becomes more possessive, Dakota Johnson really immersed herself into this role. And to reflect Ana, Christian becomes more affectionate, more romantic, his steely demeanor is just peeled back in general. Unfortunately Jamie Dornan is flat all across the board with his portrayal of Christian Grey. I get he's supposed to be a cold blooded character, but there are pinpoint moments in pieces of the dialogue where he's just absolutely cringeworthy. Like the way he says dominant & submissive instead of dom & sub. That can be contributed to writing that already isn't great, but when you add Dornan's wooden delivery it just comes out even worse. He brings no nuance or charisma to the role.

When it all comes to a head and Christian finally gets a taste of what he initially wanted from Ana, she's disgusted and flat-out rejects him. I know Christian is a creep, but I still felt some sympathy for him knowing that he was a victim of abuse. The whole lore of this initial installment in the series is Christian's suave & dominant persona, but he's really a damaged person. So this shouldn't be an indictment of BDSM practices, but of his past. The film's ending is quite abrupt. Though, it feels incomplete, it denotes to me in it's brevity a statement by James & Taylor-Johnson saying this is it. Anastasia said it was over and it is. As if the scene at the elevator that mirrors the exact moment where it all began didn't underline this sentiment, the film ends with a shot of Christian being distant in a meeting and the look of film has reverted from it's vibrant scheme back it's bleak grey one to signify Christian's state of mind and then smash cuts to black. I could be looking too much into it, but that's my honest take informed by the rest of the film. As a fan of the books my girlfriend wasn't crazy about it, but exceeded my expectations. It doesn't soar to the heights of something like Von Trier's Nymphomaniac, but succeeds in overshadowing it's source material by being a refreshing and somewhat insightful erotic drama that on top of having a female gaze also displays an interesting juxtaposition of the roles in a heretonormative relationship.