Review: "Get Out"

Director: Jordan Peele
Runtime: 103 minutes

Ambiguity is the name of the game for so many horror classics, especially those involving a domestic setting (Rosemary's Baby). Is the central character really dealing with evil and/or the supernatural, or is it - to some degree - all in their head? That first act ambiguity is a powerful part of what helps so many movies land their big twists. And yet, it's not the only way. In the new film Get Out, we know something is "off" with the environment the protagonist wanders into. The question, then, revolves around the degree of maliciousness lurking beneath the placid surface. The answer, courtesy of Key & Peele's Jordan Peele, could not be more satisfying. 

Peele's background (he started on MadTV before creating the aforementioned sketch show with Keegan Michael-Key) would suggest that his point of view is best limited to the short bursts provided by the late night format. Yet with Get Out, Mr. Peele has proven himself more than capable of taking a timely premise and stretching it to its appropriately absurd endpoint without losing steam. 

So what, pray tell, is this thing about? Well, it all starts when Chris (Daniel Kaluuya, of Sicario and the "Five Million Merits" episode of Black Mirror) goes with his girlfriend Rose (Girls' Allison Williams) to meet her upscale parents (Catherine Keener and Bradley Whitford). Some would suggest going in as cold as possible. I, through luck, read a draft of the script last summer. Yet even knowing where every twist and jump scare was located, I nonetheless found myself white-knuckling my way through....even as I was cringing or laughing hysterically. As others have pointed out, the story is essentially Look Who's Coming To Dinner crossbred with The Stepford Wives. But even with those obvious influences, it's hard to deny that Get Out is its own thrillingly unique piece of work.

In the past few years, the issue of race relations has been thrust into the American consciousness in uncomfortable ways. As marginalized voices utilize modern tools, our (by "our" I mostly mean white people) understanding of the degrees of systemic and cultural racism have been burst wide open. It's not just a matter of MLK vs. the KKK. It's all everything from flat-out declarations of racism to the understated, yet equally insidious, actions often referred to as micro-aggressions. You think the KKK is bad? Congratulations, but that doesn't mean you've never engaged in or benefited from other mutations of racism.

If all of this makes Get Out sound like a harsh lecture, fear not. It's entirely possible to enjoy Peele's story-telling based on thrills and scares alone. But I'd also argue that one's enjoyment would only increase by directly engaging with the assertions (both serious and tongue-in-cheek) of Peele's film. The subtext is not tacked on as a cheap play for socio-political relevance. It's a necessary part of telling this story, as outlandish as it becomes, well. 

And what a story it turns out to be. After two acts of planting hints and making sinister suggestions, the homestretch arrives, and it's nothing short of a masterstroke of racially-charged satire. To call the film's finale "bonkers" would do it a disservice. It's certainly insane, but built so organically off of everything that came before that it all feels wholly earned. Peele's direction is nimble, even when dealing with exposition. His actors, meanwhile, are uniformly excellent. Mr. Kaluuya is effortlessly compelling as the story's anchor (one hopes this is the film that will catapult him onto the A-list), never more so than when undergoes a session of hypnotherapy with Ms. Keener. A marvel of directing, staging, and acting, the sequence hinges on Kaluuya's emotional nakedness in the moment, and he nails it, without ever straining for a false sense of dramatic importance.

But, at least for white audiences, the real shock here is Williams. Rose is much more than the cheerful girlfriend, and Williams handles the character's shifting allegiances without ever falling out of step with the carefully-balanced tone. Imagine Williams as her character from Girls, and the whole thing somehow becomes even funnier and dead-on. Marnie can be astounding in her lack of self-awareness. By contrast, Rose enables Williams to play a multifaceted character with an outside acknowledgement of her biases and prejudices. Rose may not always "get it," but Williams clearly does, and the results are riotously good. The old adage goes "art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable." From a white viewer's perspective, it's through Williams that this notion hits home. I was tense, I laughed out loud, and yet somewhere deep down, I was left vaguely nauseous. We're meant to identify with the millennial, "woke" girl who has no issues whatsoever dating a black guy, and is embarrassed by her parents' forced hipness with black culture. By the end, those implications are deeply funny. They're also scary as hell.

Grade: B+/A-

Review: "Captain Phillips"

Director: Paul Greengrass
Runtime: 134 minutes

Movies, like any art form, have a tricky relationship with reality. And that relationship only becomes more of a hurdle when the link to reality is concrete, and the story concerns matters of life and death, or success and failure. Even when a movie takes on a story that's decades old, reality tends to act as a roadblock to complete investment on the part of the viewer. That was the case with Brian Singer's Valkyrie, which told the story of a group of Nazi officials who attempted to assassinate Hitler. The subject matter of Singer's film is fascinating, but it fails to create an atmosphere that leads one to believe that (just maybe) the protagonists will succeed. 

A similar issue looms over Paul Greengrass' newest film, Captain Phillips, even though it's a far more compelling bit of fact-based storytelling. As in the director's wrenching United 93, the basic outcome of the story is well-known, but the details aren't touched on much. Yet where Greengrass' 9/11 hijacking film was an ensemble piece, Captain Phillips ultimately zeroes in on a handful of people. Among the main subjects is the titular captain (Tom Hanks), whose cargo ship, the Maersk Alabama, was hijacked by Somali pirates in 2009.

Above all else, Greengrass has retained his ability to plunge audiences into the unnerving immediacy of tense situations. The story of Richard Phillips, his crew, and the Somali pirates has more to it than people yelling threats and pointing guns. Billy Ray's screenplay generally keeps things moving, while still allowing for the general emotional toll of the incident to build. Watching Phillips match wits with the pirates, who are often ready to counter their defensive tricks, provides the film with some of its best moments. The no-frills, crisp filmmaking enlivens scenarios where the outcome is obvious. We know that the pirates will board the ship, but seeing the back and forth between the two sides of the conflict leading up to that moment is every bit as compelling as what follows.

Where the film starts to sag is in its last section, which sees Phillips trapped on the Alabama's lifeboat along with his pirate captors. While the level of incidental detail shown on screen is technically impressive, the film's home stretch is where the story's endpoint starts disrupting one's cinematic investment. There's a point where Phillips tale, however extraordinary, has to segue into its harrowing final moments. Greengrass and Ray, however, are determined to keep stringing the viewer along, to the point where you wish the Monty Python lads would arrive and shout, "Get on with it!"

Despite the final act's excessive length, it does at least give Hanks and Barkhad Abdi (playing pirate leader Muse) room to chip away at their characters' exteriors. Even as the final stretch wears out its welcome, the two men's performances help dig beneath the otherwise clinical treatment of the story. Phillips and Muse are both pushed to very different breaking points, and Hanks and Abdi find the humanity beneath their characters' single-minded determination. Abdi, in particular, makes a strong impression, albeit less overtly than his famous co-star. Whatever his character's background and motivations (which are sketched out in a brief scene in Somalia), the actor never turns Muse into a garish cartoon villain. Muse and his crew are credible threats, but the pirates are far from the racist caricatures they could have been in less intelligent hands. 

As good as the performances are, they still aren't enough to turn Captain Phillips in to more than ordinary. Greengrass' directing is as assured as ever, and suits the material perfectly, but the writing isn't as consistently engaging as it needs to be. This problem is only magnified by the story's ripped-from-the-headlines subject matter. It's a respectable account of the Alabama's hijacking, but there's nothing the be gained from this dramatization that you couldn't get from reading articles about the incident. 

Grade: B-

Review: "Enough Said"

Director: Nicole Holofcener
Runtime: 93 minutes

It's been three years since Nicole Holofcener last released a film, and it's been fifteen years since Julia Louis-Dreyfus appeared on screen. The latter's previous appearance was in a Woody Allen's Deconstructing Harry, so it's quite fitting that her return would be in a film by the former. Though Holofcener's career is much younger than Allen's (and not nearly as prolific) her work feels right at home next to the typical Allen film. Instead of intricate plots, both directors prefer more open-ended explorations of the privileged middle and upper classes, and the various hijinks in which they dabble. And even though Enough Said's style and structure occasionally feel like that of a network sitcom, it is ultimately a highly enjoyable comedy, albeit one that operates at a broader level than Holofcener's previous work.

Having directed episodes of TV's Parks and Recreation and Enlightened in the years since her last film (2010's wonderful Please Give), it's not entirely surprising that some sitcom-y tendencies have slipped into Holofcener's authorial bloodstream. With its abundance of characters and hazily sketched subplots, Enough Said does have a tendency to feel like something of a pilot episode. Some of the comedy arrives in fits and starts, and some dialogue exchanges feel a too artificial for their own good. Under different circumstances, these traits would become large, painful thorns in a film's side. 

Enough Said, thankfully, has the low-key level of craft and acting that elevates its material into territory that is entirely pleasurable, rather than grating. That elevation comes largely from Ms. Louis-Dreyfus as protagonist Eva, and the late James Gandolfini as love interest Albert. The pair of TV titans (Louis-Dreyfus is close to beating Lucille Ball's record amount of Emmy wins) seem like an odd match at first glance. And, in fairness, it's kind of hard to picture Elaine or the Veep going for Tony Soprano. They appear to agree. When the two divorcees meet at a party, they both dryly comment that there's no one at the even they find attractive. Yet that first shared sentiment turns out to be a hidden sign. After a surprisingly enjoyable first date, Eva and Albert's relationship starts to grow in ways they never expected.

Of course, there are complications. If you've seen the trailer, you know how Eva's relationship with new client Marianne (Catherine Keener, Ms. Holofcener's muse of sorts) throws a wrench in everything. Yet whether or not you have foreknowledge of the film's surprise, it's hardly likely to affect your perception of the film. Holofcener keeps the pacing brisk, never allowing the more dramatic undercurrents of the story to suck the fun out of the film as a whole. 

At first, that makes Enough Said seem rather slight. And, truthfully, Enough Said is a modest, unambitious character-based comedy. Yet even among the sitcom-y scenes and situations, there remains a remarkable attention to detail when it comes to the characters. The ensemble is close to being overstuffed (with friends, ex-husbands, daughters, and clients), yet seeing Louis-Dreyfus and Gandolfini play against type is more than enough to give the film some intrigue. Watching the former handle less misanthropic and neurotic humor, and watching the latter be funny at all, proves to be the film's secret weapon.

With the amount of time TV stars spend in a role, they tend to become associated with a certain persona, and are thus more vulnerable to being typecast. And even though Louis-Dreyfus retains some facial tics from her Seinfeld days, by the time Enough Said rolls into its final reels, there's no mistaking Eva for Elaine. The maternal compassion and hesitant romantic longing that the actress finds, without going overboard, is a delight to watch. For such a simple set up, Enough Said pulls its leading lady in a surprising number of directions. Individually they may seem plain, but the combination that Holofcener and Louis-Dreyfus come up with here somehow feels fresh. 

More subdued, though just as enjoyable, is Mr. Gandolfini, in one of his last roles. While his untimely passing is tragic, he could still be alive, and his portrayal of Albert would be no less delightful. A self-professed slob, Albert remains good at heart. In situations where Tony Soprano would have lost his cool and started throwing punches, Albert keeps a level head and internalizes his feelings of anger and disappointment. It culminates in one of the film's best scenes, that also happens to be one of the few dramatic ones in the entire 90 minute run time. 

And even though Enough Said is broader than Holofcener's previous work, it still has her keen ability to use character-based comedy to touch on deeper emotional truths. She mines the realm of middle-aged romantic foibles for comedy and tear-jerking drama with remarkable dexterity. The humor may not be quite as successful, but it still builds effectively to several beautifully human scenes. While these moments aren't exactly enough to make Enough Said more than a good film, they further demonstrate Holofcener's gifts as an observational humorist and storyteller. Even when working at a gentler, more accessible level, the writer/director remains one of the most consistent voices among indie filmmakers, which bodes well for her future. As small as Enough Said is, it's still something of a miniature triumph for how thoroughly it fulfills its own small-scale ambitions. That's something that even personalities as disparate as Elaine and Tony Soprano could agree about.

Grade: B

"Please Give" - REVIEW

Real people are tricky, that's no secret. Putting them on screen in the form of characters? That can be a nightmare. The result is often one that is so desperate to deviate from Hollywood norms, that characters often become uninteresting, unlikeable, and even repulsive, despite being supposedly "real". Such was the case with writer-director Nicole Holofcner's 2006's effort Friends with Money. With apologies to Ms. Holofcner, hearing one wife tell her husband that she can't believe her friend, "hasn't seen [her husband's] asshole," isn't the sort of dialogue that should be thrown out within the first 15 minutes. It's crass, it's irritating, and it's an almost instant turn-off. Thankfully, Ms. Holofcner has more than learned her lesson with her most recent feature, Please Give. Though it has moments of unpleasantness, Holofcner and her cast never go overboard, and whatever meanness may be inflicted verbally from one character to another there may be, it never feels as though it's somehow pointed at the audience. Kate and Alex (Catherine Keener and Oliver Platt) are married a have a daughter, Abby (Sarah Steele). They also run a furniture store, where the merchandise comes mostly from the homes of the recently deceased. On the other end are Rebecca (Rebecca Hall), her sister Mary (Amanda Peet), and their grandmother Andra (Ann Guilbert), who happens to live next door to Kate and Alex. Though the main plot is built on the tensions between the two families (Mary and Rebecca feel that Kate and Alex are like vultures, simply waiting and hoping for Andra to die), Holofcner's film finds its strength in the funny little ways people cross paths and relate to different people differently. Kate, the best example of human contradictions, is a bleeding heart, constantly giving out money to people on the street, to the point where she's almost made it an obligation, doing whatever she can. This puts her at odds with Abby, who is obsessed with getting rid of her acne and longing for a new pair of jeans. Yet while Abby's parents feel slightly uneasy around the rather bitchy Mary, Abby has one or two moments with her...but also has two moments with Rebecca. Then there's Alex, who may or may not have been flirting with Mary over dinner. The ways in which Holofcner's characters bounce off of each other is surprisingly engaging, filled with moments of meanness, kindness, insight, and even great humor. And while indie queen Keener may get top billing and have the most outwardly expressive role, she's equally matched by Rebecca Hall (Vicky in Vicky Cristina Barcelona) as hardworking, reserved Rebecca. Every main character, from the Abby to Andra, is so wonderfully drawn, with flaws that actually feel genuine, to the point where the characters balance each other out, as opposed to Greenberg, in which the entire film was too focused on its protagonist. As a slice-of-life/intersection-of-lives story, it's also devoid of lagging moments, and ends strongly when at times you wonder if it can have a satisfying ending at all. Where other slice-of-life films often get too caught up in trying to create an atmosphere that doesn't fully materialize, Please Give is smart enough to focus wholly on its characters. The result is a strongly acted, well-paced look at the way people interact when put under a microscope, and what it really means to give, both physically and emotionally.

Grade: B+