Les Miserables

I first saw Les Miserables when I was 8 years old in a beautiful old theater in England. Sitting in that dark theater watching people on stage become Fantine and Marius and Javert, hearing the expression of such profound emotion through music... the feeling will remain imprinted in my mind forever. I never thought anything could compete with that experience, but tonight, 20 years later, in a movie theater, I was able to feel the same connection to the story as I did one night so long ago.

For those of you who don't know, Les Miserables is a story of the people. By "the people" I mean those overlooked, down on there luck, people in hard times. In the beginning, that one person is Jean Valjean (Hugh Jackman). Jean Valjean is a criminal serving a sentence for theft. He stole a piece of bread for his dying nephew. His prison guard, Javert (Rusell Crowe), makes it his mission to ensure Jean's life is as unpleasant as possible, especially when he decides to skip out on his parole. Valjean is given a second chance by an unlikely stranger. With this chance he becomes a new man who tries to do right by people. He becomes Governor of a small town and provides work for those in need. When he discovers that one of his employees, Fantine (Anne Hathaway), was fired without just cause, he promises her on her death bed that he'll take care of her fatherless child like his own, that she will "want for nothing." He keeps his promise and raises Cossette and protects her from all the threats of the cruel world. One of those threats being that they are constantly hunted by Javert, who is unrelenting in his chase, another being the brink of revolution and Cossette's sudden affection for a certain young revolutionary Marius (Eddie Redmayne). Everyone has something to loose and they are all willing to die to get what is important to them.

What a beautiful story of sacrifice and redemption, an expression of bravery and suffering. For me Les Miserables is a live piece of art that reaches out and pulls at everything that makes me human, every feeling that connects me and drives me to take actions.

Eddie Redmayne, who plays Marius, is an absolutely wonderful actor. Every look, every movement, every syllable is accomplished with an almost painful intensity. He's fantastic!

The next actor I must give praise to is someone with a some-what small, but very important role. Young Daniel Huttlestone plays Gavorche. He's a rough-tough gutsy little street kid who represents the heart and fight of the revolution. He's wise and fearless beyond his years, and seems to be at the center of what's going on in the streets. Huttlestone acts with such confidence and ease that I can't believe that he's so young and new to the whole movie world. I was beyond impressed with his performance, can't wait to see more from him.

I thought Hugh Jackman lived up to his reputaion of a theater man. He plays Jean Valjean well. I love Russell Crowe but was left wanting a little more from him. I wanted to feel his torment more deeply. His performance was a little muted for the strong stormy character Javert. Anne Hathaway gave a commendable performance as Fantine. She was really able to embody her agony with her singing. I was completely indifferent to the actress who played Eponine. It might bother me more than most because I've always felt a close connection with her. I feel like we didn't get to know her well enough, like she didn't have enough personality. Eponine is a girl that's one of the guys. A girl whose smart and tough and won't take any crap form anyone. She felt very blah to me in the movie. This leads me to another disappointment... Cossette. I keep waiting to be impressed by the actress Amanda Seyfried. I guess it's been enough for her to just get by with her looks so far. I felt no chemistry between her and her leading man Marius (Redmayne), which I don't understand because that guy could have chemistry with a rock. I should give mention to one more actor who I thought stood out. In the supporting role off Enjolras, a revolutionary and friend of Marius, Aaron Tveit's strength and integrity unites the rebels and brings a sense of brotherhood. I felt that the amazing actors were more than enough to comensate for the so-so performances.

Most importantly the movie was fantastic. It was as moving and inspiring as I remember it  being 20 years ago. Les Miserables will always be very close to my heart. I spent about 2/3 of the movie in tears, but for good reason, and it means that the movie was a success for me.
 

Salvation Boulevard

Needless to say... this one would be pretty offensive to the die hard Christians out there. So, let's just say, if you got offended by the movie Saved (written and directed by Brian Dannelly)... definitely skip Salvation Boulevard, but if you enjoyed Saved, as I did a great deal, then you might also enjoy this humorous jab at extremist believers. The story centers around an accidental shooting. The victim is Peter Blaylock, (Ed Harris) an atheist whose goal is to bring believers to see truth and reason. The shooter... (don't worry they give this part away in the previews) is famous and over the top Pastor Dan Day (Pierce Brosnan). The man in the middle... is recently saved, ex-Greatful Dead fan or "dead head" Carl Vanderveer (Greg Kinnear). Carl is married to Gwen (Jennifer Connelly) who led Carl to the Lord. Anyway, Pastor Dan, Peter, and Carl are in Peter's office discussing the idea of a pastor and an atheist co-writing a book of the two opposing beliefs when Pastor Day accidentally shoots Peter in the head. Pastor Dan proceeds... to place the gun in unconscious Peter's hand and tells Carl not to call the police.

This is when things get tricky. Carl doesn't know what to do so he calls 911 from a pay phone and anonymously reports hearing gun shots from Peter Blaylock's office. When Carl goes to his wife and father-in-law to reveal the truth about the shooting he is met with nothing but disbelief. They are convinced that he is having a mental episode of some kind. With nowhere else to turn, he goes back to the scene of the crime and confides in the security guard who coincidentally is an ex-"dead head" herself. Her name is Honey Foster (Marisa Tomei) and she represents a past life for Carl of partying and freeness that he is trying to forget. While the two are investigating, ninja like men jump out of a van covered in jesus-esque images and kidnap Carl.

To add to this huge mess, the news is released that Peter Blaylock is not dead but in a coma. Everyone is loosing their minds. Gwen, Carl's wife, is painting like a lunatic... images of demons tearing her husband away from the church and so on. Pastor Dan is trying to keep his "God's will be done" face on while really scheming a way to save his ass from jail, and Carl is trying to find a way to stay alive.

Well, Greg Kinnear is great in everything I've seen him in from Some One Like You to Little Miss Sunshine, and he was great in this as well. Pierce Brosnan has grown on me as an actor. I used to not care for him at all, but he gained my respect in Ghost Writer. In Salvation Boulevard he plays the perfect unlikable fake that he's supposed to be. For the maybe five minutes that Ed Harris is on screen he's wonderful as usual, and I love seeing Jennifer Connelly play the tightly wound unhinged lunatic. She does it so well (for example in the movie Virginia). All in all I have to say I still prefer Saved as a movie for exposing the dark sides of Christian extremists, mostly because I felt like I got closer to the characters than in Salvation Boulevard. But Salvation Boulevard was still a wonderful story of ignorance and stupidity and what you get when you stand against it... shot in the head...:) Only joking.

Detachment

Detachment is about a teacher, a substitute teacher named Henry Barthes (Adrien Brody). Barthes is "detached"... which allows him to be calm in the chaos around him. He begins substitute teaching in a high school where students threaten teachers with violence and even rape. What reward do these educators get for their time and energy? They get verbally assaulted and maybe even spat on. The kids are also academically well below par. So on top of stomaching daily harassment from students, teachers are expected to raise scores on state tests. Each member of faculty deals with the daily challenge of teaching differently. Henry walks in on his first day and says to his students that there is only one rule in his class... "If you don't want to be here, you are free to leave." He allows the kids to verbally attack him because he doesn't care, but when they attack another student they are... "free to leave." Henry slowly and some what painfully gains the respect/ trust of the classroom which then allows him to actually educate and influence.

Teaching is not the only struggle in Henry's life. Henry's grandpa suffers from dementia and lives in an assisted living facility. He visits his grandpa, who raised him, on a regular basis and is in a constant fight with his caretakers to actually care for him properly. As he cares for his grandpa he experiences flashbacks of his childhood and his mother's suicide. His mothers suicide forever haunts him.

On his bus ride home, after visiting his grandpa, he sees a young girl in a tight black skimpy top, a very short black skirt, and knee high fish-net stockings exchanging oral sexual services to a sleazy looking older man. The young girl and Henry get off at the same stop. After unsuccessfully offering her services to him, Henry decides to take her to his apartment and let her get cleaned up and stay there for the night. The two form a rare kind of bond and Henry lets her stay with him on the condition that she won't bring her "business" into his apartment. He provides a safe place for Erica (Sami Gayle), which seems like something she's never had.

I really love the character Henry. He cares but in a sensible way. He sees things clearly and has pure intentions. His emotions are guarded but that only helps him to be able to do what he needs to do. I don't know if I've ever met a character like this but it's someone I would love to know in real life. He has his problems, we all do, but he doesn't make them anyone else's. Plus, Adrien Brody is brilliant... I can't imagine anyone else playing this role and making it work. He conveys so much without doing a whole lot and I think that's an amazing talent. Sami Gayle also does an amazing job in playing Erica. She's someone you want to protect and tell her that things can change for her. She's someone you can tell could do anything and just doesn't know it.

In my opinion this movie is phenomenal! It is a story about this one man, but it's also about so many other things... it's about the education system, the pressures and realities of teaching, it's about suicide, its about family, it's about battling life's struggles. It's really a movie that everyone can relate to, and I think that viewers who work in education will have a unique appreciation for it.

Ruby Sparks

This movie has "me" written ALL over it ( and yes... mostly because it has Paul Dano in the cast... who i LOVE!). Calvin (Dano) is a young, and very successful novelist. He wrote his first and only critically acclaimed best seller when he was 19, which is enough to keep people calling him a genius and to get phone numbers from random girls, but he has been uninspired and unpublished ever since. He lives in his expensive house with his dog Scotty who pees like a girl which only adds to Calvin's own feeling of inadequacy. On a routine meeting with Calvin's psychologist, he is given a writing assignment in the attempt to end his writer's block. His assignment is to write a  fictional character who would find him, with all his insecurities, attractive and who would think his dog was cute, even though he pees in the squatting position.

That night Calvin dreams of this girl. In his dream... he's walking Scotty in the park. Scotty runs away from him and leads him to a girl named Ruby (Zoe Kazan). Ruby is laying on a blanket drawing, she's an artist. She's quirky and cute and silly and sweeps Calving right off his feet. Calvin wakes up and can't get to his type writer fast enough. He writes pages and pages about his dream girl Ruby. Then.... some thing unexpected happens... something impossible happens. There's a girl in his house! Not just any girl.... Ruby is in his house acting like she's been there all this time! She jumped right off of the page and into real life! After the shock of the situation passes and after Calvin accepts that she is not a hallucination but a real physical person, he sits back and enjoys his new life of being  "in love".

Everything is passionate and blissful until reality sets in. Even when you find the love of your life.. no one is perfect or will do what you want them to all the time... or wait... unless you have the power to make them. Calvin realizes that all he has to do is type the words and he can make Ruby do anything. Ruby is at Calvin's command with just the tap of the keyboard. If you had the power to change the mind of someone you love... would you? What about the little annoying habits or that time he or she talked a little too long to your attractive friend? What about when you thought they were thinking of leaving you or wanted a little too much space? If you could stop them with the touch of a button, would you??? Tough questions.

Ruby Sparks is fun and heartfelt and Dano and Kazan are brilliant together. The storyline is outlandish and wonderful... full of psychological questions that boggle the mind. Ruby Sparks addresses issues at the heart of every romantic relationship. It's in a genre of it's own... it's a romantic thriller. I LOVED it!

Hide Away

A journey of grief, recuperation from guilt, time for suffering in peace... is the best way I can express the film Hide Away. Agony of the human spirit is brought to life beautifully and poetically. A broken man buys a broken boat. He stays docked through the winter while he goes mad dealing with the demons of his past. "Sometimes one must go completely insane before sanity can be reached"  is what I observed from the main character, played by Josh Lucas. And sometimes madness is best accomplished alone. As he slowly regains his sanity he gradually restores his boat. On land sits The Boathouse Cafe, run by a weathered man with a white beard (James Cromwell) and his captivating daughter (Ayelet Zurer). They assist the troubled man in mending his boat and his life. Hide Away is a story of healing. As gentle and fragile as it is dark and ominous, Hide Away is a rare peek into human emotion.

Friends With Kids

What happens to friendships when people get married and have kids? The answer... all kinds of things, but one thing is certain... those friendships do not stay the same. In Friends With Kids, Jason (Adam Scott), Julie (Jennifer Westfeldt), Ben (John Hamm), Missy (Kristen Wiig), Leslie (Maya Rudolph), and Alex (Chris O'Dowd) are best friends. Everything changes when they all meet for Dinner one night and married couple Leslie (Rudolph) and Alex (O'Dowd) announce that they are having a baby. They say that things won't change and they will still be "cool" and not turn into psycho parents, but time tells a different story. After having kids the six friends meet less often, and when they do meet, things are significantly more stressful. Even married couple without kids, Missy (Wiig) and Ben (Hamm) are growing less happy. The two unmarried friends Jason (Scott) and Julie (Westfeldt) look at the lives of their married friends and realize something... they don't want to become like them. They also realize, however, that they do want to have a child before it's too late. The answer... Julie and Jason decide to have a child together with no romantic attachment... simply two friends conceiving and  parenting the same child.

So one awkward sexual encounter and one pregnancy test later Jason and Julie have a beautiful baby boy, and seemingly the perfect set up. They rest of the group is in awe of how smoothly their situation works and maybe even a little resentful. They take turns with diapers and feedings and even live in the same apartment. Everything is perfect until Julie starts to feel left behind when Jason gets serious with a big busted, young, flexible dancer. Then... the situation flip flops when Julie seems to have found the man of her dreams.

A rustic wood cabin sets the scene for tensions to be let loose and hurled at one another on a group ski trip with all six friends plus kids in attendance. It's difficult to express the complexities and significance of all these different relationships and how they affect one another in a few short paragraphs, so I recommend watching the movie and judging for yourself. If the up and down dynamics of friendships and marriage is something that appeals to you... you will appreciate Friends With Kids. I love these actors. Who wouldn't love Kristen Wiig and Maya Rudolph? They rock my world :)

Safety Not Guaranteed

Let's just begin with WONDERFUL and AMAZING! This is by far one of my favorite movies of all time! We begin in a conference room during the meeting of a magazine company. The editor asks for fresh titillating ideas. Journalist Jeff (Jake M. Johnson) voices interest in the local advertisement of a man looking for a partner to travel through time with him. Jeff's editor gives him the okay and allows him two interns to help. He chooses bold but somber Darius (Aubrey Plaza) and and nerdy Arnau (Karan Soni). Jeff rubs everyone the wrong way and it turns out that he's not even interested in the story, he actually picked that story because it's where his old high school fling lives. So while Jeff is focused on hooking up, Darius and Arnau head up the investigation to find out who the time traveling man is. Darius approaches Kenneth (the time traveling man), at the grocery store where he works. She goes in undercover as a girl who is sincerely interested in time travel. Eccentric doesn't even begin to describe Kenneth. To the average person he appears completely out of his mind... but kooky as he may be, Darius soon finds that Kenneth is also very good hearted and intriguing. Slowly the two gain each other's trust and begin training for their travel.

 So, the questions remain... is he brilliant or crazy, a genius or dangerous? How will the "story" play out and how far will Darius go to play along? Oh, and who are the big guys in suits spying on Kenneth and watching his every move? To find out the answers to all these strange questions please go see this movie!!!

 Aubrey Plaza and Mark Duplass have beautifully unique onscreen chemistry. They are a perfect balance of hard and soft, of crazy and sane. This is the first time I've ever seen Plaza, but I definitely hope it's not that last. The repressed emotion and genuine goodness that she shows through her character really connects the viewer to the heart of the story. And Mark Duplass.... I just love Mark Duplass in general. He leaves his character's flaws exposed and that brings a true to life quality to his interactions with other characters. I cannot think of anyone else who could make such a strange person like Jeff so likable. I don't know how he does what he does but I'm so glad that he does it! I love the actors, love the story, love everything single detail about this movie!