Filmstruck Friday: Glengarry Glen Ross (1992)

I haven't seen many other movies directed by James Foley. I can't even say that I remember his name when I am not ensuring that I get the details right for this movie review. But he's the man at the helm of one of my favourite films. Yet, and I know this may seem unfair, he's probably the person I would credit least with helping to make this film great. I save most of the praise for the writer, David Mamet adapting his own play for the screen, and the cast, which I will get to in due course.

The plot revolves around a bunch of real estate salesmen who get quite a shock when the company sends along a no-nonsense "axeman" to lay down the law - the top salesman will get a prize, the second will get a lesser prize, third place gets you fired. Knowing that there are a whole stack of new, promising, sales leads in the office, the group start to be tempted, being used to doing whatever it takes to get sales and earning their own commission.

It's hard not to write this review and just fill up space with choice quotes from this movie. Fans of Mamet will already know him as quite the wordsmith, pick any film he's been a part of and you can find some magnificent dialogue, but this may well be his best work, which is quite the compliment when you think of his other stuff (off the top of my head, I highly recommend both House Of Games and The Spanish Prisoner). It's not just the individual soundbites here, Glengarry Glen Ross is an ensemble piece that makes sure everyone involved has at least one chance to relish their role.

Where to begin with the cast? Al Pacino is there, giving a very entertaining performance even as he teeters on the edge of the full self-parody he would ease into by the mid-1990s, Ed Harris is at his angry best, and Alan Arkin is a man who feels less assured and more out of place among the more savage salesmen he works with. Jonathan Pryce is also wonderful for every moment he's onscreen, playing a potential customer being "wooed" by Pacino. You also get Kevin Spacey as the man in charge of the office, and in charge of those precious sales leads, and Alec Baldwin in such a brilliant bit of scene-stealing that I believe, but could be wrong, it set him on the right path of decades of scene-stealing ahead of him, something he does so much better than any lead roles (sorry Alec . . . like he'd ever read this). Despite all of that talent on display, and not one of the cast members lets the side down, the best performance in the movie comes from the one and only Jack Lemmon. It's hard to properly convey just how absolutely brilliant he is here, giving a masterclass in acting as his character is, by turns, bitter, manipulative, charming, depressed, elated, foolish, wise, and more. He seems to be the hungriest of the group, a hunger born of his current situation and his recollection of his past glory days.

Okay, I guess I should give more credit to Foley. Not only does he make sure that the camera is pointing the right way (although this is a very unfussy adaptation of the play that could just as easily have been, with a few tweaks, a straight recording of the show) but he makes the most of the cast and does a great job of not trying to fix anything that isn't broken. Unlike the onscreen events, this is very much a team effort.

The only things stopping Glengarry Glen Ross from being a perfect movie for me are the fact that a) it feels a bit stagey during the few times when I am not distracted by the script, b) I would have preferred some better resolutions for a couple of characters who just end up exiting before the final scenes, and c) there is no c. I just wouldn't have felt right if I ended the review without a reminder to Always Be Closing.

9/10

You can buy this fantastic movie here.
Americans can buy it here.

The Rocketeer (1991)

From the films of his that I have seen, director Joe Johnston hasn't made a movie yet that I have disliked. Okay, I may have dodged his worst films (I've yet to see The Pagemaster and Hidalgo, to name two contenders) but the man seems to be a consistently safe pair of hands for mainstream blockbuster fare.

Not that you would always know that at the time. Just look at the poor reception for some of his perfectly acceptable outings (Jurassic Park III and the really very good The Wolfman). Which brings us to The Rocketeer.

I am not going to try claiming that The Rocketeer is a misunderstood masterpiece. I am not going to create any petition for it to be given a special edition re-release and some overdue sequels. I'm just here to tell you that it's a good film. Sometimes it's very good. It's also easy to see why it didn't really set the box office alight.

Bill Campbell plays a young pilot, Cliff, who finds a prototype jet pack that was stashed away by a thieving crook. Using the jet pack, with a helmet made by his buddy (Peevy, played by Alan Arkin), Cliff turns himself into quite the flying sensation. His real identity may be a secret but everyone will know him as The Rocketeer. Unfortunately, this gets him caught in the middle of a Nazi plot. It also doesn't help him look any better in front of his beautiful girlfriend (Jenny, played by Jennifer Connelly), or the dashing actor (Neville Sinclair, played by Timothy Dalton) who might be looking to steal her away.

Not quite lively and bright enough for younger viewers and a bit too silly in places for older viewers, The Rocketeer finds itself in a strange middle ground. It's hard to know who exactly it is made for. Having not read the graphic novel it was based on, I don't even know if fans of the source material would be pleased or disappointed. All I can say is that this always appealed to me thanks to the many mornings I found myself watching TV and catching some random episodes of King Of The Rocket Men.

As well as the main jetpack-based premise, there are a lot of other simple pleasures here. Campbell may not be the most charismatic of leads, but he does perfectly fine in his role (feeling very much like the old-fashioned kind of wholesome lead he is supposed to be). Arkin is fun, Connelly radiates, and Timothy Dalton might just be the most fun that he has ever been in a non-comedy film. Seriously, almost every moment featuring Dalton's character is a delight.

You also have some wonderful production design, it's just a shame that they somehow didn't lean in even further with the retro style, and you get a rousing score by Howard Shore. There's also some nice swashbuckling, some enjoyable aerial stunt work, Paul Sorvino and Terry O'Quinn having fun in supporting roles, and an excerpt from a fake film that I really wish we had seen become a reality; The Laughing Bandit.

Johnston may show restraint throughout much of the film, certainly in comparison to the approach of some other directors, but he makes the most of the set-pieces to throw some great action on the screen, and make things as bombastic as they can be. It's an instinct that serves him well, and served him equally well when he was employed to helm the excellent Captain America: The First Avenger almost two decades later.

7/10

Get this Bluray, which plays here on UK players as well as on American players (from my experience). Sadly lacking in extras though.

Noel (2004)

I was hoping to like Noel. Why? It was a Christmas movie with a good cast, and it was directed by the fantastic Chazz Palminteri. I like Christmas movies, in case anyone somehow hadn't noticed that yet, and I like Chazz Palminteri. I also like Susan Sarandon, Paul Walker, Penelope Cruz, Robin Williams and Alan Arkin, all of whom star in the movie. Sadly, the film just isn't that good. It does for Christmas what the likes of Valentine's Day and New Year's Eve did for their respective occasions. Which is to drain it of all magic and instead fill it up with cheap manipulation and saccharin sweetness.

What's the storyline? It's a selection of criss-crossing story strands. Susan Sarandon plays a lonely woman who devotes most of her attention to her hospitalised mother. She eventually meets a man (Robin Williams) who seems to know just where she is at in her life at that exact moment. She also meets a young woman (Penelope Cruz) who is being driven away from her boyfriend (a cop, played by Paul Walker), due to his explosive temper. Walker, while trying to win back the woman he loves, is approached by Alan Arkin, playing a man who seems to see the reincarnation of his ex-wife in the young man. Oh, and there's also a man (Marcus Thomas) who wants to spend the evening in hospital, because his happiest memory was when he was hospitalised, as a young boy, and got to enjoy the Christmas party thrown for the patients.

Written by David Hubbard, Noel features a handful of good performances that are wasted in a pile of schmaltz. Schmaltz is a hard thing to avoid in any Christmas movie, but this one is especially bad. The musical cues, the journeys of self-discovery, the warm, Christmassy glow suffusing every scene, it all works to remind you that you must feel the joy of the holiday season. You must sense the magic, despite all of it being very basic stuff executed with very little style.

Palminteri, who also gives himself a fleeting cameo, doesn't direct with any confidence. Thankfully, he gains a few bonus points by assembling a good cast, but that's about the only thing that the movie has going for it. Sarandon, Walker, Arkin and Cruz are all very good, Thomas is okay, although he just has to keep repeating the same idea over and over again, and Robin Williams does the quietly contemplative act he's been doing in his serious roles for years now (the regret, the wry grin, the soft and quiet manner).

It's a shame that I've ended up rating this even lower than many of the TV movies created at this time of year, but this one had the chance to be much better. It feels more like a wasted opportunity, which isn't the feeling I want from my Christmas movies as the end credits roll.

4/10

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Noel-DVD-Pen%C3%A9lope-Cruz/dp/B000BY9CWM/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1386192829&sr=8-1&keywords=noel

Mother Night (1996)

Kurt Vonnegut Jr. is a writer who, I am sad to say, I have never read. Despite hearing great things about Slaughterhouse Five I've just never managed to delve into his work. Yet. Based on the content of this movie adaptation of Mother Night (one of his works), whether it sticks rigidly to the source novel or not, that is something I will have to change soon because the man writes some thought-provoking stuff.

Nick Nolte plays Howard Campbell, an American who grew up in Germany and became a successful playwright. As an adult, he fell in love with an actress (Sheryl Lee) and somehow managed to enjoy his life while avoiding intense scrutiny from the Nazis. However, when he is asked by a mysterious stranger (John Goodman) to consider working as an American spy his whole life changes. All he has to do is work for Germany, deliver speeches over the radio (speeches that have been annotated with a code he follows even though he doesn't even know the meaning of it) and continue living his life of relative privilege. Of course, that's only all well and good until the war ends and it's really when Howard moves on throughout his adult life that the questions raised at the very beginning of the movie start to burrow into your mind and take hold.

Directed by Keith Gordon (who will always be Arnie from Christine to me), and adapted for the screen by Robert B. Weide, Mother Night is a stunning movie once the premise is fully established about ten or fifteen minutes into proceedings. It's about good and evil and how complex, and close, those two things can be, highlighted in a central character who pretends to be someone evil to do good, but may well have also been responsible for a lot of evil deeds while playing his part all too well. Does pretending to be someone evil actually make you evil?

The interesting material, and it's made all the more interesting thanks to the ambiguity always weaving through the material (I, personally, couldn't make up my own mind as to whether or not I found Howard Campbell to be evil), is made all the better thanks to a fantastic cast. I've never been the biggest fan of Nolte, but I think this may be his best performance. It's certainly the best thing that I've seen him in. Sheryl Lee plays the love of his life and she's someone else that I've never been all that impressed with. I think she got luckier than she could have ever hoped when she landed her role(s) in Twin Peaks, but here she gives a very good performance, especially in the second half of the movie. John Goodman lends his usual greatness to the film - though, on a side note, how MANY times has Goodman played someone on the sidelines who ends up greatly influencing the main events? I think it may be his specialty - and so does Alan Arkin. Arye Gross also does well with his small role, Kirsten Dunst has an even smaller role and David Strathairn has mere seconds onscreen, but is always worth looking out for.

Unjustly neglected by many people, including myself (for which I am appropriately annoyed), over the past 15 years, Mother Night is a film well worth seeking out and giving 110 minutes of your life to. It's a new favourite of mine and I hope that others enjoy it just as much.

9/10

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mother-Night-DVD-Nick-Nolte/dp/B00024763I/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1361157914&sr=8-2

So I Married An Axe Murderer (1993)

AKA the Mike Myers movie that many people forget about because he's not being Wayne or Austin Powers or Shrek.

So I Married An Axe Murderer seemed to come and go without much fuss back in 1993. I'm not sure if it was considered a flop at the time, but it certainly didn't set the box office alight. That's a shame because this is a very enjoyable comedy with some great characters, a decent cast and a constant supply of decent chuckles.

Myers stars as Charlie Mackenzie, a man obviously afraid of commitment. His friend, Tony (Anthony LaPaglia), can testify to this and tries to get Charlie to see the error of his ways, to no avail. Charlie comes up with all kinds of reasons to explain why his ex-girlfriends became ex-girlfriends (one was a kleptomaniac, one smelled of soup). Circumstances change for the better when he meets Harriet (Nancy Travis). As the relationship blossoms, Charlie tries to put his usual behaviour behind him, but when he reads up about a killer named "Mrs. X", a murderous bride who has been killing her husbands on their honeymoon, he starts to wonder if the lady he loves might not have a very dark and dangerous side. And as he tries to dispel his worries, more and more circumstantial evidence starts piling up.

Well, well, well, I did not realise the negativity surrounding this movie until researching how it was received before writing this review. This seems to be a mixture of people wanting to take Myers down a peg or two after the huge success of Wayne's World and the star also starting to slip into the bad habits that would develop in later years (his penchant for playing multiple characters, in particular, also known nowadays as "doing a Murphy"). Writer Robbie Fox was understandably a bit miffed when it was claimed that the script was changed so much that he should consider a "story by" and co-screenplay credit. Mind you, Neil Mullarkey ended up getting no credit, despite working on a lot of the content. Director Thomas Schlamme found the shoot difficult, but also praised Myers for his total commitment (how ironic, considering the theme of the movie).

Whatever the mood behind the scenes, all that matters to viewers is what ended up being caught on camera and I think that So I Married An Axe Murderer is a fine little comedy. The script, by whoever you want to give the credit to, is full of amusing one-liners and great exchanges and Schlamme moves everything along nicely, helped by a typically upbeat selection of pop songs.

The cast have a lot of fun. Myers isn't at his most comfortable playing someone who is so "normal" but he gets to make up for that in the scenes in which he plays his own father, Stuart, a hilariously stereotypical Scotsman who spends a lot of the movie insulting his other son (Matt Doherty) for having an oversized "heid". Brenda Fricker is also very good as May Mackenzie, Charlie's mother who often gets carried away in the company of Anthony LaPaglia. Speaking of LaPaglia, he's just fine, whether he's asking his boss (Alan Arkin) to be more like a movie police captain or whether he's trying to commandeer a vehicle from a reluctant member of the public (Charles Grodin). Nancy Travis is very good in the role of Harriet (she's a lot better here than she was in those Three Men & A Baby/Little Lady movies). The cast also includes Amanda Plummer having a lot of fun and very small roles for Phil Hartman and Debi Mazar, all are great.

I don't expect too many people to wholeheartedly agree with me on this one, but I hope that at least some people enjoy themselves with a film that, in my opinion, was given some unfairly harsh treatment upon its initial release.

7/10

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Married-Murderer-Blu-ray-Region-Free/dp/B00171EEAI/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1359910468&sr=8-2